5 arrested after latest St. Louis-area protests

ST. LOUIS – Police have arrested five people in Ferguson following the latest round of protests over a white former St. Louis police officer’s acquittal last month in a black suspect’s shooting death.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that police told about 50 protesters gathered Friday outside the Ferguson police station to leave several times.

The newspaper reports that most people moved to the sidewalk, but a few remained. Police made the arrests about 40 minutes after the crowd gathered.

Protests have been occurring in the St. Louis area since mid-September, when a judge acquitted Jason Stockley. He was charged with first-degree murder in the 2011 shooting death of Anthony Lamar Smith.

Ferguson also was home to protests after an officer fatally shot Michael Brown in the St. Louis suburb in 2014.