Live updates: Protests in Baltimore

Just before 10:30 p.m., with almost no one but reporters remaining, U.S. Rep. Elijah Cummings declared the night a successful one for Baltimore.

“We are very proud of what happened tonight,” he said. “We are very, very proud of our folks.”

Appearing with state senator Catherine Pugh and Baltimore councilman Nick Mosby, Cummings sought to assure residents that leaders were focused on the Freddie Gray case and the broader issues that it has brought to light. Of Gray, he said that there are two federal investigations, and he is confident in how the attorney general is handling the matter.

“We will never let that issue die until it’s fully resolved,” he said.  Later, he said it was “questionable as to whether” Gray should have been stopped by police, and he alleged that Gray asked for medical attention that he did not get.

Cummings said that the relationship between the African-American community and the police was “the civil rights issue, along with voting rights” of this generation.

Pugh said of the night: “We showed the nation that Baltimore can protect in peace.” She noted that a fist fight that broke out was between two brothers, one who wanted to go home and one who wanted to go elsewhere.

Pugh, too, promised she would “not rest” until a full investigation into Gray’s death was completed, and she promised to put money into west Baltimore to improve life for residents there.

Mosby said the issues facing Baltimore were not unique, but promised of his city: “We’ll get back to normalcy.”

Protests cropped up in other cities across the country Wednesday as a show of support for the demonstrations in Baltimore over the death of Freddie Gray.

Read about the demonstrations nationwide on Post Nation.

The crowd, except for members of the media, has almost completely dissipated, though dozens of reporters are still milling about the intersection.

After a few moments of drama — a fist fight, a march that ran into a police line, a mysterious pop and some smoke near the library — U.S. Rep. Elijah Cummings grabbed a bullhorn and marched around the intersection, saying repeatedly, “Let’s go home.”

The scene then was almost comical. Cummings, who had earlier stood in a crowd of dozens of people to talk about the impending curfew, was now being chased by almost exclusively reporters and cameramen.

Lines of riot police formed on North Avenue on both sides of Pennsylvania, but they never moved. Even when there was a pop and smoke, a single uniformed officer moved to inspect.

Minutes before the beginning of curfew, there was growing unease at Pennsylvania and North avenues.

Just before 9:40 p.m., U.S. Rep. Elijah Cummings grabbed a megaphone and addressed the several dozen demonstrators who were lingering on the sidewalk.

“It’s about 9:38,” he said. “I don’t want anybody to be arrested. Nobody. Thank you. Let’s move on.”

Some in the crowd guffawed, and soon after, a fight broke out that spilled into the roadway. The fight quickly dissipated, and a group of men locked arms and marched down North Avenue, moving from the check-cashing business that burned toward the CVS. “Go home,” they chanted.

After only about 100 feet, they were met by a wall of armored police with riot shields. Behind them sat armored vehicles. Reporters stopped to take some photos, and the line of people moved back.

At about 9:50 p.m., they milled about in the roadway.

D.C. protesters arrived at the White House from Chinatown at around 9 p.m.

During their march, protesters talked about the living wage movement in D.C., greedy politicians, gentrification, reparations and police brutality.

“Reparations now,” they chanted right before they arrived at the White House.

“All these issues are connected,” protester Gaurav Madan, 29, said. “We are trying to fix a system that prioritizes property and profits over human life.”

Organizers delivered short speeches and led more chants in front of the White House.

“Whose house? Our house,” they chanted.

Saucha Robinson, a Coppin State University student, stood outside the Baltimore Central Booking and Intake Center waiting for her boyfriend. She was released from the facility at about 7 p.m. Wednesday after being detained for two days without receiving formal charges.

Robinson, 18, was one of about 100 people detained during Monday’s unrest and eventually released because police were not able to charge her within a 48-hour window.

She said she was one of the many “innocents” arrested.

“I understand what was going on out here,” Robinson said about the riots and violence.

“But it doesn’t mean that the process and paperwork should stop in [the booking center],” said another woman who was also recently released for the same reason.

Robinson said she was arrested Monday around 9 p.m. as she was on her way to school. The education student said she was near Mondawmin Mall when she saw the police making arrests and she ran from them, she said.

“My initial instinct is to run from whatever is going on,” Robinson said.

The 34 D.C. police officers who were deployed in Baltimore earlier this week, including this morning, will not be patrolling in Baltimore tonight, D.C. police spokeswoman Gwendolyn Crump said.

A group of black young people asked D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser to take the city’s officers out of Baltimore earlier today. It was also one of the most frequently echoed demands during the march tonight in D.C. from Chinatown to the White House.

Eric Ellerbee held a megaphone and implored the protesters who gathered outside of Baltimore City Hall to continue their demonstrations after the media have moved on to the next story. “They think we’re going to go away, but we’re going to keep on going until we’re finished,” he said.

The 30-year-old lifelong Baltimore resident works as a forklift operator, and in an interview, he said, “The people of Baltimore won’t give up until there is justice.”

“Whether you wear a badge or not, if you commit a crime, you need to go to jail,” he said. “What I want for my community is respect.”

Hundreds of people, with assistance from D.C. Police, shut down the busy Chinatown intersection of 7th and H streets NW on Wednesday evening, protesting in solidarity with Freddie Gray and those marching in Baltimore.

“All night, all day, we’re going to fight for Freddie Gray,” they chanted.

The diverse crowd of mostly young D.C. residents carried homemade signs. Some said “Racism is the disease, revolution is the cure;” one said “White silence is violence;” and many said, “D.C. cops out of  Baltimore” — a reference to the Metropolitan Police Department personnel who are assisting in Baltimore.

“I’m out here tonight because change has to happen,” said Sherita Sweeney, 30, a D.C. native who now lives in Maryland. “Sitting behind your laptop, tablet or cellphone complaining — you’re part of the problem, not the solution.”

At about 7:40 pm, protesters began marching west on H Street behind banners for the Black Power National Black United Front and “Stop Racist Police Terror,” with the sound of Public Enemy’s “Fight the Power” playing on a loudspeaker.

–Fredrick Kunkle contributed reporting.

Baltimore Police Commissioner Anthony W. Batts did not say what the charges were, but he said 16 adults and 2 juveniles were arrested in Baltimore today, as of about two hours before the 10 p.m. curfew tonight.

He also said that police would consider prosecuting at a later date the people who were arrested on Monday and released without being charged this afternoon. “We’re not giving up on them. We’re just going to follow up,” he said.

At the press conference, he held up a rock to show the sort of objects that have been thrown at police this week. He also said that police found an “inert device” at the intersection of North and Pennsylvania avenues.

Wednesday has been mostly calm, he affirmed. He described the large march to City Hall as “extremely peaceful” and said he did not expect a problem enforcing curfew tonight.

A few hundred people gathered peacefully in protest against police brutality about 7 p.m. under the Chinatown gate in the District. Several speakers climbed into the back of a pickup in the middle of the intersection at 7th and H streets NW to address the crowd. People waved signs such as “Stop the War on Black America” and “‘Business As Usual’ Kills Black Americans.”

“This isn’t a riot, it’s an uprising,” said Eugene Puryear, a protest organizer with the group DCFerguson.

“I’m just frustrated and heartbroken about what’s going on,” said Olivia Byrd, 26, a Howard University student from Sacramento, Calif. “One of the things that needs to change is these police officers should be held accountable for their actions. How do we trust our justice system if it keeps allowing this to happen?”

Gov. Larry Hogan on Wednesday pleaded with Baltimore residents for “another quiet night” and promised that every state agency is working to help the city recover from Monday’s riots.

Maryland State Police Col. William Pallozi and National Guard Gen. Linda Singh echoed Hogan’s remarks during a joint news conference at the Fifth Regiment Armory in Baltimore.

Singh said her troops are “ready to stand tall and make sure we are taking care of our city.”

Hogan said about 2,000 National Guard personnel and roughly 1,000 state and local police are in place to keep the peace in Baltimore.

“This combined force will not tolerate the violence or looting which has led to the destruction of property and put innocent Marylanders at risk,” he said.

Hogan also discussed his visit to Baltimore’s Sandtown neighborhood, saying he was “encouraged by the optimism and the amount of people helping out there.”

He acknowledged that the riots are still taking an economic toll, despite Tuesday’s relative calm.

“We’re losing dollars every day,” he said. “People are afraid to come into the city, and businesses are still closed.”

He added that his wife, Yumi, will meet with Korean-American owners of two businesses that were destroyed during the riots. The first lady is also Korean-American.

“We’re going to get back to that Baltimore that we all love,” he said.

By about 6 p.m. Wednesday, many of the people who were scheduled to appear before a judge at the John R. Hargrove Sr. District Court building in Baltimore had made it through the churn of bond review hearings. Others were set for release after they managed to post bail on their own.

The quiet court hallways Wednesday evening stood in stark contrast to the activity this morning.

With an overwhelming number of arrests during Monday’s riots, the public defenders office scrambled to find representation for those still detained. Public defenders from other jurisdictions and private defense attorneys volunteered to help, with some racing to Central Booking at 7:30 a.m. to interview clients and prepare them for their hearings before rushing to court.

By the end of the day, the onslaught of stories from arrestees turned into a blur of similar circumstances. Men accused of filling bags with bottles from liquor stores. Women who said they were not at looted shops to steal but to track down their children amid the chaos. And alleged rioters who said they were on their way home but “at the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Through the back-to-back hearings, judges, prosecutors and public defenders argued: Should the court set bails high to prevent a repeat of Monday’s brick-throwing and window-smashing? Or should the court release people who were simply being opportunistic by snatching up a pair of stray shoes on the street?

At least one teen appeared before a judge Wednesday. She was charged with malicious destruction of property and burglary on Monday. The judge let her go. It was her first arrest and she didn’t have a prior record.

“She appreciates that so she can go back to high school,” said her public defender.

The teen, who appeared in court remotely through a television monitor, cheered and high-fived other women in the room with her after the judge said she could go.

One man was not so lucky. Accused of trying to take merchandise from a looted shop, the judge revoked his bond in one of the last cases of the day. The judge was worried the man would be a flight risk due to his extensive criminal record.

“No bail!” the handcuffed man could be heard yelling through the television screen. “What the f—?”

Magician David Blaine said that he, along with his team of personal videographers, drove to Baltimore to “offer some nice distractions” to the people of Baltimore.

“I am not trying to resolve anything. I just want to be here, to let people know we care and to see people smile for a moment,” he said.

He performed several card tricks for guys wearing blue bandanas over their faces, with 40-oz. bottles of malt liquor at their feet.

One man, Al, wrote his name on an ace of spades and slid it in the middle of the deck. Blaine shuffled the cards. Al took the first card off the deck. It was his. The only card with his signature. “Damn,” Al said.

Baltimore City employees working at a municipal building along the protesters’ route to City Hall came down to watch and support the marchers, one of whom handed them flowers.

“To see this unity…it portrays to the world that what you see on TV is not what Baltimore is about,” said Jeanette Walker, one of the city employees. “To see these young people, and they understand what they’re here for.”

In New York City and Boston, crowds are demonstrating tonight to protest Freddie Gray’s death. Protesters are planning to gather in Washington as well at 7:30 p.m. at the Gallery Place Metro station. They plan to march to the White House.

Here are some images of the gathering in New York:

And in Boston:

At a playground very near the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues, the famed magician David Blaine has attracted a crowd of about a dozen youths with some card magic.

His first trick only had about three watchers (including this reporter), but it was a good one. Pick a card. Watch multiple shuffles. Take a picture with the deck facing away from you. Your card shows up in the picture.

The shocked squeals more than quadrupled his audience.

Certainly he’s not going to make civil unrest or police misconduct disappear, but he’s giving a group of kids a happy diversion. Said one: “I watch your show all the time. I still can’t figure out what you do.”

Katrina Bell McDonald, a sociology professor at Johns Hopkins University, was shaking hands with a few of the police officers scattered along the protest marchers’ route. “The police have been pretty amazing, actually,” she said. The officer in charge of leading the group is a Johns Hopkins alumnus, she said, and told her he was proud to do it. “They’re just letting it be,” she said.

She is the faculty adviser to the black students union, which helped organize the march. She estimated the crowd to number thousands of people.

Protesters are marching from Penn Station to City Hall, chanting, “Tell the truth and stop the lies. Freddie Gray didn’t have to die.” The crowd stretches several city blocks.

Dee Collins was taking her two sons, 9-year-old Leke and 8-year-old Goje, to a Family League meeting near Penn Station about school closings. But they stopped to check out the protest march that was forming. Her sons were running around counting helicopters and news cameras.

“A lot of this problem has to do with schools,” she said, noting that the rioting started with kids who had to take buses to get to class. Her kids’ school, Arlington Elementary, is closing its middle school component, and she said several nearby schools are already closed.

“It’s beautiful,” she said of the racially diverse group of marchers. “It’s very important that people from all cross-sections come together so people understand it’s not acceptable, police brutality.”

The stark image of National Guards troops standing at attention, rifles at their sides, have melted into yesterday’s memory. The troops in the Inner Harbor area seemed to blend in on Wednesday. They sat among tourists, took pictures with children and patronized the local Bubba Gump restaurant.

Esther Jung sells bangles, purses and colorful scarves from her mall cart inside the Light Street Pavilion at the Inner Harbor. While there are many more people walking about the Inner Harbor today and a wider selection of restaurants open, business is still slow, Jung said.

The Harborplace mall is dimly lit inside, since most of the corporate-owned businesses kept their doors locked. Jung said the management company for the  shopping center made the decision for her on Tuesday by shutting the entire place down. Today, she opened later.

“I don’t blame the government” for their reaction to the violence, Jung said. “It’s scary.”

Although she said she believes the worst is over, rumors about downtown demonstrations on Friday could keep her from opening up her little cart of accessories. “We’ll see what happens.”

Several downtown Baltimore business owners say that the true menace created by Baltimore’s unrest is financial.

Liquor stores, bars, restaurants and entertainment venues surrounding Camden Yards were feeling the economic burden of a spectator-less baseball game on Wednesday that would ordinarily have drawn tens of thousands of people. This on top of a curfew that will make the streets barren by early evening.

While city and law enforcement leaders proclaim normalcy and calm are returning to Baltimore, some business owners are looking at their end-of-the-month numbers and seeing nothing but red ink.

“It all comes just as baseball season starts. This is an absolute disaster,” said Pete Rush, managing partner of the Goddess Gentlemen’s Club on Eutaw Street. “We were expecting this would’ve been a record-breaking April.”

The Orioles, which won the American League East title last year, was expected to draw large crowds to start the season.  Monday and Tuesday’s games were postponed, while Wednesday’s game was played to an empty stadium, as no tickets were sold. A weekend series against the Tampa Bay Rays was moved from Camden Yards to Florida.

Many of the business owners near the ballpark did not want to talk openly about the curfew or protesters, since they feared criticizing city leaders or inviting retribution from demonstrators.

One business said they had been heavily criticized for boarding up their windows and doors earlier this week. The trickle of customers that had come into local bars and restaurants paled in comparison to the dozens of patrons they typically see during a regular season Orioles game.

The suffering is being felt not just among the business owners, but also workers, many of whom depend on tips.

Typically, Rush said, on a Wednesday afternoon there is a line around the corner of his business full of eager patrons. At 4 p.m. — happy hour — there was no one. His dancers, who have rent and bills to pay, are complaining about the lack of customers.

One liquor store owner said he has seen a 20 to 30 percent drop in sales since the 10 p.m. curfew was issued. Most of his customers come in after 11 p.m., after getting off work.

Employers said they did not understand why the city chose to issue a curfew first and then bring in the National Guard.

“The National Guard should be protecting the businesses while they stay open,” said Omega Fisher, a self-employed resident who overheard a reporter’s conversation with Rush, the strip club manager.

“The people of Baltimore are pissed,” the 55-year-old added. “It’s embarrassing. Grown people don’t need curfews.”

Rush said he hopes Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake (D) reconsiders the curfew before Friday — a crucial day for many businesses the area. The city, he said, is also losing out on sales tax revenue.

Outside Camden Yards, die-hard fans pressed themselves against the outer fence to catch a glimpse of their favorite players. Every batted ball and glove smack reverberated crisply through the empty cavern of a stadium.

Some gave interviews to national and local media outlets, including one woman who only gave her first name, Amanda. She questioned why current events had stopped baseball, when the sport has had an enduring legacy of perseverance through wars and other events in American history.

“I’m pissed off we don’t have baseball,” she said bluntly.

Lt. Gov. Boyd Rutherford made a subtle pitch for the Republican Party at a meeting with local activists Wednesday afternoon at a new NAACP satellite office in Sandtown.

To combat poverty and unemployment, “we’ve got to fight the status quo. Larry and I fought the status quo to get here, so we’re willing to do it,” Rutherford said, referring to Gov. Larry Hogan, a fellow Republican.

People who are doing things the way they always have been done have “told you that they were your friends, but they’ve never had to change anything,” Rutherford said.

He recalled telling a woman complaining about vacant houses when he was campaigning in Walbrook Junction, “‘Nothing’s going to change if you keep voting for the same folks.’ Because they don’t have to change if you vote for them, you’re basically telling them everything is fine.”

He talked about supporting charter schools and revamping vacant housing policy in Baltimore, saying they have to see if the city will go along with the latter.

He also said the state would work on lowering barriers to employment for ex-convicts, including expungement and changing laws that bar felons from some jobs. He said his administration would return to former Republican governor Robert Ehrlich’s policy on pardons, and that “the previous administration didn’t really want to do anything about that.”

A newly recruited volunteer from the neighborhood, whom NAACP chapter president Tessa Hill-Aston met at the protest Monday, was impressed.

“It ain’t about Republican or Democrat,” said Tommy Whittle, 42. “It’s about coming down into the community. He’s here; I don’t see nobody else here.”

Most of those gathered at the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues vigorously advocated peace Wednesday. Not 24-year-old Quintin Stewart.

Stewart, of Baltimore, said the rioting was a reaction to real frustrations, and it was hard to condemn completely.

“It was wrong, but it was right,” he said about the burning of the CVS. “They can rebuild that, but they can’t bring that mother’s son back.”

Stewart says he was punched by police many years ago, and he showed a reporter two missing teeth that he said were knocked out in that encounter. Of the situation in Baltimore, he said: “You can say what you want. This is our civil rights movement.”

Stewart said he was frustrated by the portrayal of Baltimore’s young people on the news and upset that reporters would leave town before any living conditions actually changed. He said he wanted respect, better educational opportunities and higher wages.

At a briefing just before 4:30 p.m., Baltimore police Capt. Eric Kowalczyk addressed a widespread perception among activists in Baltimore and news organizations that the police department would issue a public report Friday that would contain findings about its investigation into the death of Freddie Gray.

Kowalczyk, the department’s spokesman, said there was never a plan to publicly issue any findings, noting that doing so could harm any criminal investigations or charges that could be filed. Instead, he said, Friday is the department’s self-imposed deadline for police to give its findings to city prosecutors.

“There has been a lot of conversation about a report. There is not a report that is going to be issued,” Kowalczyk said. “What we are going to do is turn over our findings, all of our investigative efforts, to the state’s attorney’s office.”

“By turning these documents, our findings, over to the state’s attorney’s office as quickly as we can, we are being accountable to them, and we are being accountable to the public,” Kowalczyk said.

The public library was a refuge on Monday when the CVS across the street was set ablaze, and a pit stop for protesters the following day, but on Wednesday it was just a library again. On the computers, people played games, checked Facebook, did homework.

“We’re pleased,” said Melanie Diggs, who manages the Enoch Pratt Free Library at North and Pennsylvania avenues. “It’s a community feeling.”

Nikko Caldwell was at one of the computer stations showing friends his moments of fame from the previous day — a picture with Jesse Jackson and an interview on MSNBC.

“I went viral!” he said. A member of the Bloods gang, Caldwell was “calling for peace.”

The library quiet was occasionally broken by the sounds of the remaining protesters gathered at the street corner, in particular preachers telling the crowd to get right with God.

J.R. Mosley, 32, a manager at the Baltimore Service Center Check Cashing business at Pennsylvania and North avenues, said his business never truly closed amid the unrest. When rioters trashed the CVS on the opposite corner, Mosley said he and a few others just locked up, armed themselves with guns and stood by the door. No one gave them trouble, he said.

“Our store was not touched whatsoever,” he said.

Mosley said, though he didn’t work on Tuesday, he was told only a few customers came into the store — many likely deterred by what was essentially a police barricade. By Wednesday afternoon, he said, he had served dozens — though that was significantly less than normal.

“It’s usually a lot busier than this,” he said.

As Mosley talked with a reporter, two customers came into the store. Ebony Goins, 26, of Baltimore, immediately brought up the riots.

“I was praying for y’all yesterday,” she said to Mosley. “You know what? It’ll all come out in due time.”

“Unfortunately,” Mosley responded, “I don’t think it’s over.”

Mosley said that while he thought there was “some normalcy coming back,” he still worried about later. “Time will tell,” he said. “We’ll see when the sun goes down.” Mosley said he was also worried about Friday, when Baltimore’s prosecutor is expected to receive a report about Freddie Gray’s death.

“If it’s determined that Freddie Gray was wrongfully killed, I don’t know if you want to call it manslaughter or homicide by the police, then it’s gonna be a lot worse than what we’ve already seen,” he said.

Said Goins: “I’m praying for better days.”

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan said Wednesday that the National Guard is likely to remain in Baltimore at least until Monday, when the current curfew ends.

“Even if it appears calm, there’s still the potential for problems Friday and Saturday, and we want to be on top of it,” Hogan (R) told reporters at the Maryland Emergency Management Agency headquarters in Reistertown, Md.

During his visit, the governor met with MEMA officials and talked with members of his cabinet by phone.

Hogan also said he talked with White House adviser Valerie Jarrett on Wednesday to update the Obama administration on where things stood. He said he asked that President Obama and Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake (D) help tamp down expectations that a prosecutor’s report will be released on Friday, since the release date is still uncertain.

“There are some high expectations from some people that there will be [a report on Friday], and they’re concerned that that might cause a problem,” he said. “I think [the White House] is  sending someone from the Justice Department out to talk to the city about how to manage that.”

Hogan noted that the city is ultimately responsible for completing the report and releasing it.

The governor also said he talked with U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch on Tuesday about the technical aspects of deputizing officers from other states to help keep the peace in Baltimore.

“We’re doing everything we can to support the city and get things back to normal,” Hogan said.

Just after 3:30 pm, 7-year-old Elijah Cheeks grabbed a white piece of chalk and scrawled “LOVE” on the wall of the CVS that was looted and burned Monday. His father, 27-year-old Robert Cheeks, a Baltimore warehouse worker, said he had brought Elijah and his two brothers, Josiah, 4, and Noah, 2, to the shop “just to be a part of history in a positive way.”

“I can’t see my city go down like this,” Robert Cheeks said.

At the same corner, donations of bottled water and ice for police officers piled up. And several chess games got started on card tables outside the boarded-up store.

Neil Keller, 55, a retired federal government worker from Rockville, said he came up to Baltimore on Wednesday hoping to help. Armed with his work gloves, he headed to the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues, hoping to help restore some normalcy.

Mission: not quite accomplished.

“I was going to help clean up, but the cops are blocking all the burned out stores, and saying, ‘You can’t go in there, it’s a crime scene,'” Keller said.

Of course, normalcy at the eye of a riot is gradual. JAS Beauty Mart bore a neon green poster that claimed, “We are open open open,” but its metal barriers were pulled down by 3:30 p.m.

A CVS that was looted on Monday had been boarded up, and people had written chalk messages on its brick walls, including “Love,” “Unity” and “Freddie Gray.” A day earlier, people went in and out freely, touring the charred wreckage.

Keller said that — at least in the afternoon — the intersection was peaceful, and he felt at ease.

“Everyone here is very friendly,” he said. “I feel as comfortable here as in my living room.”

Attorneys for the state public defender’s service are seeking the immediate release of 68 people who have been held without stated charges or bail hearings since Monday, when they were detained by law enforcement amid protests and riots.

Natalie Finegar, deputy district public defender for Baltimore City, said her office was filing cases Wednesday in Baltimore Circuit Court contending the detentions are illegal under state court rules that require individuals arrested without warrants to come before a “court commissioner” with 24 hours to hear the charges against them and have a chance at bail.

Finegar said the 68 clients her office is representing at this point are those whose incomes qualify them for legal assistance. They were among a group of 111 people her office interviewed who have been held since Monday without charges, she said.  Some of those detained, Finegar said, told public defender attorneys that they had not been fed or given medical attention since their arrests. The group held without charges includes a person who said he is a freelance photographer, Finegar said. She did not have details of his arrest at hand.

Finegar said she was not certain the legal challenges brought by the public defender would be heard Wednesday.

“We don’t even know what these people are being held for,” said Paul B. DeWolfe, Maryland’s Public Defender. “We question the wisdom of suspending justice for arrestees in this time of civil turmoil,” DeWolfe said in a statement.

Following unrest Monday night, district courts in Baltimore City were closed Tuesday, but DeWolfe said it was not clear why it was not possible to have those arrested appear before court commissioners, who work out of a central booking facility.

DeWolfe said his office also was aware of juveniles detained without charges being filed, and he said his office would argue that juveniles held for violating the city’s curfew on Monday night should have been released to their parents by police and not held for any time.  “Those are detentions we would say are illegal,” said DeWolfe.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan defended the legality of delaying court appearances.

Hogan said he suspended the 24-hour rule as part of his executive order that declared a state of emergency in Baltimore City.  In a letter Tuesday to the administrative judge of Baltimore City’s district court, Hogan said that the delays were needed due to the volume — more than 200 arrests made during the protests and unrest in the city. He said those held would be brought before commissioners no later than 47 hours after they were held.

Hogan said early Wednesday that courts were waiting on charging documents from police, and needed time to get them.

Some initial court appearances had begun to take place Wednesday afternoon before court commissioners, but it was not immediately clear how many of those cases overlap with the list of detentions challenged by the public defender’s office.

Baltimore police spokesman Eric Kowalczyk said Wednesday afternoon that there are 111 people who are awaiting formal charges. To charge them, he said, police must find the officer who witnessed the alleged crime and determine details of the time and location of the incident. He stressed that during the rioting there was “a lot of moving activity” and officers were focused on keeping the streets safe. If arrestees can not be processed within 48 hours, he said, they will be released.

“We do not want to violate anyone’s constitutional rights,” he said. He and the public defender’s office said if people are released, charges could still be filed.

Many of the lawyers representing those arrested in connection with Monday’s riots said jail conditions were deplorable.

With few people able to make bail and few being released, central booking is severely overcrowded, they told judges.

“He has not had a mattress on his bed at the detention center,” said Linda Ramirez, a private defender who volunteered her services Wednesday to help Maryland’s overwhelmed public defender’s office with bail review hearings. “No sheets, no blanket, no pillow.”

Her client was charged with theft after police said he and others were pushing a trash can full of 132 liquor bottles from a store.

Ramirez said other clients reported being crammed into a jail cell as water from a leaking toilet covered the floor.

In another courtroom, one defense attorney said her client had to “sleep piled onto other people.”

Former Maryland governor Martin O’Malley defended his “zero-tolerance” policing practices during his days as Baltimore’s mayor during an appearance Wednesday at a Catholic church in the city’s Sandtown neighborhood, where he helped hand out food.

“It’s very hard to conclude anything but hundreds and hundreds of lives have been saved,” O’Malley, a likely Democratic White House contender, said when asked by reporters about policing during his tenure in Baltimore, which ran from 1999 until he became governor in 2007.

While Baltimore saw a sharp drop in violent crime, critics have said O’Malley’s policy, which included arrests for even minor infractions, helped fuel mistrust of the police — a grievance that has been aired anew following the death of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old African-American, in police custody.

O’Malley declined to discuss what impact the rioting and looting that followed Gray’s funeral on Monday might have on his political prospects.

“That’s not where my head’s at,” O’Malley said, following a couple of hours spent organizing and handing out food in the impoverished neighborhood where Gray had lived. He said he was there because “I wanted to be with the people that I love and the people I served for all of my professional life.”

O’Malley also said he was puzzled by a comment earlier Wednesday from his successor, Gov. Larry Hogan, expressing surprise that O’Malley showed up on the streets of Baltimore on Tuesday.

“I don’t know why he would be surprised,” O’Malley said, noting that he lives in Baltimore.​

Tahira Said, 37, often buys groceries at the Shoppers at Mondawmin Mall, she says. Normally, the store has dozens of shoppers milling about, jammed in the aisles. But on Wednesday, there were only a handful. It only took her about six minutes to get in and out.

“This is surreal,” she said. “It really is like being in a war-torn country.”

The Shoppers is the only store of about a half-dozen businesses opened. A manager said the store closed “briefly” Monday at the height of the unrest.

Outside the mall, dozens of armed, uniformed police were stationed around the perimeter.

Employees at the store had to run outside to inform the officers to allow shoppers into the store since it was open. “They thought we were closed,” one cashier said.

Wanda Griffin, 35, walked several blocks to her neighborhood grocery store, the only place she can get fresh produce within 20 minutes of where she lives.

“Things are returning to normal, I think,”Griffin said. “It’s taken a minute. But we’re getting there.”

Kenny Gilmore, 52, a counselor from Baltimore, stood at the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues on Wednesday afternoon with a camera around his neck. He was both advocating for social justice, and documenting the devastation of his city.

At about 3 p.m., all was peaceful at the epicenter of unrest, but Gilmore said he was fearful it might manifest elsewhere, particularly at nearby Frederick Douglass High School, where students were soon to be dismissed.

“It ain’t about the adults down here,” Gilmore said. “It’s about these kids who are about to get out of school.”

And those kids, Gilmore said, had legitimate beefs, even if their methods of expression were misguided.

“We been living in police brutality for some time now,” Gilmore said. “We ain’t going for that no more.”

Gilmore said he was concerned, in particular, about Friday, when he expected the city’s prosecutor to talk about Freddie Gray’s death without offering substantive information.

“She gonna come out and say, ‘I got the findings. I got the facts. And now I gotta review them,'” Gilmore said.

How would Baltimore react to that?

“It’s not gonna be good,” he said.

The Rev. Donte Hickman stood outside the Southern Baptist Church in east Baltimore. Across the street was a smoldering mound of concrete and steel. It was the day after a fire gutted the church’s $16 million senior citizens center, which was under construction. The fire was so intense that  the metal of  church’s bus melted down to a skeleton.  But in an interview Tuesday afternoon, Hickman remained hopeful.

Rev. Hickman, talk about what happened at your facility, and moving ahead.

Yesterday our senior housing facility, 60 units with a transformation center, was engulfed in flames. That center was the catalyst of transformation for our community. It provided needed services for those who begin to rebuild and restore their lives here, while also providing affordable housing. [The project] would bring a supermarket and needed amenities in the community.

The  building was engulfed with flames, but it did not destroy our faith and our hope. It was just evidence that this is something needful in the community. And what the enemy meant for evil, our God is going to turn it around for our good.

Is there any dollar amount?

It was a $16 million investment placed in this community. We know that our Lord and our God is a provider. And we will not lose hope in this.  What was $16 million might have not been big enough for God. God wants to do something greater.

You have been working in this community a long time. Talk about how young people are frustrated while they still should be responsible. And what is your message to the young people or those who have done this?

I exist for the young people. We exist for the disadvantaged citizens of our city. We exist for community redevelopment. And so my message is a message of hope and change.  We are here as the people of God, not isolated and insulated from you. We stand with you to help you gain more opportunities for your life.

What are the ministers saying? And what is the plan in going forward in terms of overall Baltimore?

What has taken place in this city has galvanized ministers like never before, and we are all trying to work across denominational lines and across religions and faiths because we stand together as one people. We have to take back our city. Not from the young people but from so many systemic evils and forces that threaten the life of our city.

As you walk across the city, you see endless rows of boarded up homes, boarded up facilities. Is that part of the hopelessness ?

It is absolutely a part of it, but I see the potential and the promise of it. I see homes that one day can be rehabilitated and renovated  for the purposes of quality living. This is an opportunity that God has given us to overcome again.

Baltimore police spokesman Eric Kowalczyk said that police were trying to get the more than 200 people who were arrested on Monday processed in the court system within 48 hours, but that they would let some people go without charging them if they cannot process all the cases in time.

As of now, 111 people, out of 209 arrested Monday afternoon and evening, have not yet been charged, Kowalczyk said at about 2:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Each person must be charged within 48 hours of the time he or she was arrested, he said. Ordinarily police have 24 hours to charge someone, but the state of emergency declared by the governor on Monday doubles the time.

“We do not want to violate anybody’s constitutional rights,” Kowalczyk said. But charging people is a time-consuming process: Police must identify the officer who arrested each person, and that officer must write a statement of the probable cause for the arrest.

Additionally, 35 people were arrested during the 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew that began on Tuesday night, Kowalczyk said. He said that only one was a juvenile.

Police will monitor school dismissal this afternoon, he said, and will remain stationed at intersections that have been the site of protests. “At areas where we know there’s a potential or where we know people gather, we’re going to continue to have resources available,” he said.

Just after 2 p.m., perhaps about a hundred people, maybe fewer, were milling about near the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues, the center of Baltimore’s most intense unrest in recent days. Traffic moved through the intersection with relative ease, and about a dozen police officers in uniform, not riot gear, stood casually mingling with bystanders and religious officials. More officers were stationed up the street.

Like Tuesday, the atmosphere was something like a festival — albeit without an overwhelming crowd today. Some members of Uproar Church in Owings Mills set up a bounce house and gave away free hot dogs to passersby, although they took it all down about 2:15 p.m.

“We do this every month anyways, but we just wanted to do an extra one to show Baltimore some love,” said Jennifer Lear, 29, of Glen Burnie.

In her first public remarks since her swearing-in address on Monday, Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch called for an end to the violence in Baltimore and said she is hopeful that the tension will ease soon.

“I want to make clear once again that these senseless acts of violence are not only a grave danger to the community – and they must stop – but they are also counterproductive to the ultimate goal here, which is developing a respectful conversation within the Baltimore community and across the nation about the way our law enforcement officers interact with the residents they are charged to serve and protect,” Lynch said at the beginning of a cybersecurity industry roundtable at the Justice Department on Wednesday.

Lynch said she has been in direct contact with Maryland officials, including the governor, and has directed the Department of Justice to provide any assistance officials need to restore calm.

“I also want to express my deepest condolences to the family of Freddie Gray,” Lynch said. “The Civil Rights Division and the FBI are already conducting a full and independent investigation into the tragic death of Mr. Gray. And both the office of community oriented policing services and the community relations service have been working to defuse tensions as that process continues.”

Lynch said that Vanita Gupta, who heads the Justice Civil Rights Division and Ronald Davis, director of the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Office, are meeting with faith and community leaders in Baltimore, and they visited a police officer last night who remains hospitalized after being injured in the conflict

“They told me he seemed to be in good spirits and I want to convey my best wishes for his speedy recovery,” Lynch said.

“I am heartened that the unrest seemed to ease last night and that members of the community are trying to come together to clean up their city. And I am hopeful that progress will continue in the coming days,” Lynch said. “The difficult situation there highlights so many issues that are part of our national debate…. Like so many cities, Baltimore is struggling to balance great expectations and need with limited resources.  It is dealing with balancing the challenges of public safety and community expression.  And it is home to more than 620,000 people.  It was their home that the peaceful protesters were trying to make better.   And it was their home that the injured officers were trying to protect.

There was the man accused of wheeling a trash can full of liquor bottles down the street. A woman arrested after police reportedly saw her picking up a stray package of toilet paper outside of a gutted Family Dollar. And a man police arrested after he allegedly broke into a shoe store to steal sneakers.

On Wednesday, they all beamed onto televisions at the John H. Hargrove Sr. District Court for bail review hearings. For many of the 60 to 80 people scheduled for hearings Wednesday, it was the first time they had seen a judge since they were arrested in connection with Monday’s looting and riots in Baltimore.

The charges included theft, looting, burglary and “fleeing with merchandise.” Three district court judges saw the men, women and a few juveniles starting at 10:30 a.m.

Garard Anderson, 28, was the first to appear before Judge Kathleen M. Sweeny on Wednesday. He was charged with malicious destruction of property, burglary, attempted theft and several other charges.

The commissioner had set his bond at $175,000 after he was first arrested. The judge later reduced it to $100,000.

“When you break into a business, when you take advantage of that situation, that is not protesting,” Sweeny said. “That’s opportunistic. If he does make bail, what’s to keep him from going back on the street and doing it again?”

It appeared that few if any of the defendants who had a bail hearing were released on their own recognizance, with judges citing a concern for public safety and a fear that Monday’s violence would be repeated.

Anderson’s attorney, Linda Ramirez, argued that her client’s actions were out of the ordinary, and she requested that his bail be lowered to $2,500. Ramirez said many of those arrested in connection with Monday’s riots were caught up with the mob.

“Certainly 99% of those people are acting out of their normal character,” Ramirez said. “He was swept up like so many are.”

Dozens of armed, uniformed law enforcement officers are positioned around the perimeter of Mondawmin Mall, where the riot began on Monday.

“I haven’t seen anything like this since 1968 and I hope I never see anything like this again,” said Terron James, 66, who walked several blocks from his home to view the scene.

The mall is located directly across the street from Frederick Douglass High School.

The dean of the law school at the University of the District of Columbia urged students to take part in protests in Baltimore, even offering to defer an exam for those who help people on the street with legal advice.

Dean Shelley Broderick of the David A. Clarke School of Law told students that community and police relations “is the civil rights issue of our time,” and that law school leaders want students to be part of the “energy and commitment” of the protests.

Read more on Grade Point.

Gov. Larry Hogan (R) said he is concerned about the impact the recent unrest in Baltimore will have on the state’s ability to bring in more jobs and businesses.

“Things like this don’t help,” Hogan said. “It’s a problem. We already had serious economic problems in our state and particularly in Baltimore City.”

“Our focus for our administration is economic development, trying to bring more businesses, particularly to Baltimore City.”

Hogan said the state has lost “a lot of money” in immediate revenue, with national ball games canceled and businesses closing early. He did not have an estimate on how much revenue has been lost this week.

Hogan said the state has more than money to recover.

“It’s the reputation we’ve got to heal,” he said. “We’ve got to convince people that it’s a great place to come. We’ve got to get the tourism dollars back, and we’ve got to convince companies that they need to stay here in Baltimore and to convince other ones to come.”

Hogan said he was forced to cancel a news conference this week with McCormick, a Baltimore-based company that has been in Maryland for 125 years, to announce that it plans to stay in Maryland after considering a move to Pennsylvania.

“We need more success stories like that,” Hogan said. “I hope we move beyond this crisis and get back to our primary focus of economic development and jobs.”

Meanwhile, Hogan said he was “glad” that fans will not be able to attend the Orioles’ game on Wednesday.

“That’s where command center is for the entire operation,” he said. “It’s the eye of the storm. And we’re glad there is not tens of thousand of people there today.”

Workers are removing the plywood boards, sweeping up glass and installing new windows at the Ace Checks Cashing store that was burned out here in the Penn-North community.  Workers say they have no idea when the store will reopen.

Baltimore is expanding access to mental health services for any residents who might need counseling.

City agencies and private providers of mental health services have expanded their offerings in light of the crisis in the city, and the American Red Cross is sending teams of volunteer mental health professionals, the city said in a news release on Wednesday.

The release told residents that they can call 410-433-5175 at any hour of the day or night for help in a mental health emergency. To schedule an appointment with a mental health provider, residents can call Behavioral Health System Baltimore at 410-637-1900.

The city health commissioner also encouraged community groups, churches and schools to reach out if they would like counselors sent to their locations. Those groups can e-mail bchd2@baltimorecity.gov to make a request for counselors.

There was no hesitation about bringing in reinforcements the last time Baltimore rioted. Then-Mayor Thomas L. J. D’Alesandro III had two days to watch other cities erupt over the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination before trouble came to Charm City.

“Baltimore caught on fire two days after 10,000 federal troops went into Washington, D.C.,” D’Alesandro recalled this week. “Once they closed Washington, a lot of those hoodlums came over to Baltimore.”

D’Alesandro had met earlier in the day in Annapolis with then-Gov. Spiro T. Agnew, who was on alert for any disturbances.

“I said, ‘Governor, I don’t have anything report to you as far as any incidents in Baltimore, but I can tell you this, I feel concerned about how quiet it is,” D’Alesandro, now 85, recalled saying.

He returned to Baltimore, and about 5 p.m. got a report of a disturbance along Gay Street, a business corridor. D’Alesandro initially thought local police could contain it, but it spread too quickly. He called Agnew for reinforcements about two hours into it, asking him to send in the National Guard.

But even the guardsmen proved no match for the fast-spreading riot. By 9 p.m., D’Alesandro said, he put in another call to the governor, asking for federal troops. They arrived by the next afternoon.

“The toughest thing that I remember is riding back the next night along Park Heights Avenue, watching, I think, the 82^nd Airborne Division walking down Park Heights Avenue,” he said.  The difficulty was grasping that the riot had “gone this far, that we had to go to the limit.”

Even so, D’Alesandro said there was no question that city police needed help to restore order. More than 5,000 people were arrested.

D’Alesandro, the son of a former mayor and the brother of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), declined to comment on how Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake has handled the current crisis. He said the whole episode needs a swift and thorough review.

He said the toughest part for Rawlings-Blake is yet to come: rebuilding after the riots. He said the city must quickly come up with plans to help businesses recover; control any future uprisings with help from other local and state law enforcement agencies; change police training to ensure officers treat citizens with respect; and give the city’s poor reason to believe that government is aware of their problems and is helping.

He knows Baltimore has overcome worse than this, but he questioned how many times a city can bounce back.

“It’s too tough to completely rebuild the city,” D’Alesandro said, noting not just this week’s riot and the one in 1968, but the Great Baltimore Fire of 1904 that ravaged downtown.  “Even 40, 50 or 60 years [apart], it’s too often to regain the image for the city. I don’t know how many shots Baltimore is gonna have as far explaining these kinds of things. … If it doesn’t stop, it will have a very serious reflection on the Baltimore of the future. That’s why speed is of the essence.”

Updated at 1:45 p.m.

The Mondawmin Metro subway stop and bus loop have reopened, officials said.

Original post at 12:07 p.m.

Authorities said they’ve closed the Mondawmin Metro subway stop and bus loop as of 11 a.m. Wednesday.

The bus stops on Liberty Heights Avenue and Reisterstown Road, near the Mondawmin bus loop remain open.

Metro Subway, officials said, is operating to Johns Hopkins station but is bypassing the Penn-North and Upton Market stations. Local bus service is operating with several diversions.

The move to close the Mondawmin bus loop and Metro stop comes “at the request of the Baltimore City Police Department,” transportation officials said in a statement.

The Mondawmin station is adjacent to the Mondawmin Mall, which was the site of confrontations between police and protesters on Monday.

Light Rail is operating as regularly scheduled as is MTA Mobility services, MARC Train and MTA Commuter Bus.

Officials said those wanting more information on transportation over these next few days in the Baltimore area should go to www.mta.maryland.gov.

On Wednesday afternoon, after a morning of relative calm, the agitation nearly spilled over in Baltimore.

Mounted Baltimore police officers inched toward the corner of Fayette and Holliday streets, where a group of mostly young protesters were chanting.

More than a dozen had climbed a flag stand, and speakers aired their frustrations through a bullhorn. A few sobbed in their anger as they spoke to the large crowd gathered in the plaza where national media had set up their equipment for live shots. In unison the demonstrators declared, “All night! All day! We will fight for Freddie Gray!”

But after several minutes of peaceful protest, the once-stationary group shifted toward the intersection where officers were atop horses.

It’s unclear what triggered the incident, but the tension heightened suddenly and protesters went on alert. The chasm between the group and police narrowed.

That’s when the president of the Baltimore NAACP chapter, Tessa Hill Aston, and others stepped in. They put themselves between the screaming protesters and mounted police to quell the rising acrimony. Hill Aston hugged and kissed young people while ordering them back to the sidewalk, “Please stand down! Get on the goddamn curb! Move!” Many other – older – voices issued the same commands.

Just as quickly as it had devolved into an impending clash, the situation was defused. The group marched away from downtown back to the epicenter of the protests at North and Pennsylvania avenues in West Baltimore.

Hill Aston, who was wearing a navy blue blazer with the NAACP letters embroidered in gold, said she was understood how precarious the situation was, but she blames the officers for aggravating it: “They didn’t have to keep creeping. … They were wrong.” She said she spoke to one young woman who began to weep in her arms and told her: “I love you, go home. You came peacefully, chant and go home. Get away from here. Don’t let them provoke you like that.”

As the demonstrators marched away, Hill Aston said she was going to follow them to make sure they all got home safely.

“I can’t be everywhere, but tonight I was here,” she said.

To call this situation weird would be an understatement, yet everything about Wednesday’s Orioles-White Sox game at Camden Yards feels normal, except for the non-existent crowd. The music is here, the reporters are ever-present and the PA system is blasting Top 40 hits and classic rock.

White Sox players are stretching, and some Orioles are throwing a football around in the outfield. Tennis is on the press-box television. The scoreboard is doing scoreboard things.

But the concourse is completely dead. Everything is closed, and prepared food products are just sitting on carts strewn about.

Click here and here to read more about the Orioles’ strange game today.

Prince George’s County executive Rushern L. Baker III (D) said that watching Baltimore erupt has been an education for nearby Prince George’s County.

He called an emergency meeting with his executive and cabinet members this week after watching Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake tackle the crisis, criticism and cleanup of her city.

Rawlings-Blake (D), Baker and Montgomery County executive Isiah Leggett (D) make up a trifecta of black power in the center of Maryland, leading the largest jurisdictions in the state and well-practiced in coming to each other’s aid in political battles. Together, they have advocated on behalf of their respective priorities in the General Assembly, like their collective push for state education spending.

Baker said he shot off a text to Rawlings-Blake on Saturday and offered the support of his entire government – particularly social services – to help Baltimore heal.

“They are going to need help beyond these days of unrest,” Baker said.

Prince George’s County has had its own attention-grabbing troubles with police brutality cases. The county police, in the country’s wealthiest majority-black jurisdiction, has struggled to emerge from its reputation as an aggressive force with a strained relationship with the community. A series of deadly shootings and beatings by county police officers and biting incidents involving department K-9s exacerbated the tension. The allegations of excessive force brought in the Justice Department in 2004 to monitor the department’s operations and put it under independent review.

Baker, who was elected to office in 2010, has presided over significant drops in crime and a prevailing effort to rehabilitate the county’s local and national perception. His “Transforming Neighborhoods Initiative” employs a community policing model that brings officers into close contact with the residents they patrol. The county sent many officers to bolster the Baltimore City police.

“We want to give people the ability to voice grievances and have the best opportunity to address issues immediately,” Baker said. The turmoil in Baltimore reminds Prince George’s of the need “to make sure people feel engaged and redouble our efforts to do so.”

Still, police brutality cases such as the 2012 police beating of a University of Maryland student hearken to a problematic past that is not quickly nor easily resolved.

Gov. Larry Hogan (R) said he was surprised to see that his predecessor, Martin O’Malley (D), was walking the streets of Baltimore on Tuesday.

Asked by a reporter about charges leveled by some that O’Malley, who is considering a presidential run, returned to Baltimore to gain exposure, Hogan said: “There are a lot of cameras here in town and some people are looking for attention. I’m just focused on the crisis. I’m here to answer your questions, but we’re really here trying to heal the community.”

O’Malley, who lives in Baltimore, served for seven years as city’s mayor before becoming Maryland’s governor in 2007.

He canceled a series of paid speeches in Ireland earlier this week to return to Baltimore.

O’Malley, who is preparing to launch a potential presidential campaign, spent part of the day on city streets, where at times he was heckled. Some residents blame O’Malley, who took a tough stance on drugs and crime, for the troubles between the police and the community.

Meanwhile Hogan said on Wednesday that “people” coming to town to “make political hay. It doesn’t make sense.”

“A lot of outsiders are coming in to get their face on television,” Hogan said. “We could do without all of them quite frankly. We just want the community to heal. We want to get things back to normal. And all these folks coming in from out of town, it would be best if they didn’t.”

Updated at 1:25 p.m.

All court business, except for bail reviews, was postponed in Baltimore on Wednesday, as the city processes people who were arrested during the looting and riots earlier in the week.

All of Baltimore’s district courts were shut down, except for the John R. Hargrove Sr. District Court Building on Patapsco Avenue.

About 60 bond review hearings are expected to begin at 10:30 a.m. in three courtrooms; most are expected to appear via video from central booking. The day’s cases are likely a mix of those charged in connection with riots and arrests unrelated to protests court officials said.

“Of course there will be an uptick because of the protests,” said Terri Charles, deputy director of the Maryland Judiciary Office of Communications and Public Affairs.

Courts went to “maximum staffing” to handle the influx of cases, with public defenders, commissioners and prosecutors working to process those arrested, she said. A back-up in bail reviews is also expected as courts were closed Tuesday due to unrest in the city.

Joseph Kent was not on the docket to be presented for a bail review Wednesday. The community activist’s name has been trending all morning on social media after his arrest on live TV Tuesday night.

Authorities have said roughly 200 people have been arrested in the past few days in incidents related to protests, violence and riots in the city.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan said the law gives the state the flexibility to extend the 24-hour deadline for people arrested without warrants to see a court official to 47 hours. They are waiting on charging documents from police, he said, and need more time to get them.

Baltimore residents cleaned up and there were signs that things were trying to get back to normal — even as a heavy law enforcement presence remained around the city.

One sound — the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, playing at a free outdoor concert. At one point, the musicians played “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

On Wednesday afternoon, the crack of the bat will be heard as the Orioles play the Chicago White Sox at Camden Yards. But there will be no cheer of a crowd, because the stadium won’t be open to the public.

As the city works to clean up after days of unrest, here’s a look at the Baltimore City Public Schools district.

As the Post’s Valerie Strauss writes — it is a challenged one, no doubt.

According to district statistics, 84 percent of the 85,000 students are eligible for free and reduced-price lunches — a measure of low family income.

In 2013, the last year for which there are complete scores on the Maryland School Assessments, only 14 percent of students scored “advanced” in math and 18 percent in reading. The chronic absence rate in 2014 was more than 24 percent. And the district has an estimated $108 million budget deficit that is likely to result in the “elimination of hundreds of teaching and staff positions,” according to the Baltimore Sun, as well central office layoffs, a reduction in transportation costs and other savings.

But there has been some progress reported in some areas. The dropout rate fell from 24 percent for 2010 to 12 percent in 2013. And the four-year graduation rate rose from 61.5 percent in 2010 to 69.7 percent in 2014.

And there is this — (warning – this contains lots of great pictures of kids with teachers, volunteers learning and doing fun stuff) —

https://twitter.com/MsPingel/status/593017431536316416/photo/1

Gov. Larry Hogan (R) spent part of Wednesday morning walking through the neighborhood where Freddie Gray lived, stopping at a basketball court to shoot some hoops and visiting a satellite office for the city branch of the NAACP that is set to open next week.

Hogan said he went to Sandtown to personally thank NAACP officials for their work in helping to quell violence on Tuesday night.

“I just came here to thank them,” Hogan said. “Last night was a lot better than Monday night.”

He said the actions of the NAACP and other community leaders helped to keep things under control.

Before visiting the NAACP office, where the group will have three floors to do outreach work in the community, Hogan tried his hand at shooting a few basketball shots with three young men playing on the court.

“Think we can take ’em,” Hogan said to Keiffer Mitchell, a senior adviser, former Baltimore councilman and former basketball player.

Hogan missed three shots from the foul line. “I’m quitting after this,” he said.

He tried again — and missed.

“This for the news: Governor sucks,” Hogan said chuckling.

Michael Lyles, 23, who lives a block away from the basketball court said he was glad to see Hogan stop in his neighborhood. However, he doesn’t think it will amount to much change in his community.

“I just feel like he’s going around because of the protests,” he said. “If he did it on a regular day, it might mean more.”

The president of Johns Hopkins University has called on the campus community to condemn the violence and take hope from the resilience of the city.

The research university canceled classes and postponed events Tuesday. No violence occurred on campus, a university spokeswoman wrote in an e-mail, but there were some close calls. The school reopened Wednesday.

See the full story here.

The Rev. Louis Wilson, who grew up in the Chicago area, rioted as a teenager during the protests around the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Now he serves as a pastor of New Song Community Church, a Presbyterian Church of America congregation about two block from where Freddie Gray arrest site.

He spoke to The Post on whether Baltimore’s religious leaders have influence and how Christians can navigate the tension between justice and peace.

See the full story here.

Members of Uproar Church set up an inflatable playground and slide for children in the Baltimore neighborhood that is considered “ground zero” for much of the protests and outbursts of violence. Children enjoyed playing next to a CVS store that had been looted and burned on Monday.

“Our main goal is to bring the community back together,” said Jaleen Johnson, 20, a member of the Owings Mill, Md.-based church.

In other parts of the city, there were signs that some help had arrived.

https://twitter.com/johnwoodrowcox/status/593431716569567232

https://twitter.com/johnwoodrowcox/status/593432393144508416

About a half dozen members of Omega Psi Phi fraternity from Virginia and Maryland, wearing their Greek-symboled, purple and gold T-shirts and hats, gathered in Baltimore on North and Pennsylvania avenues, amid the recently burned buildings.

“We came here to show our presence. To help. To do whatever we can,” said Terrence James, 32, of Alexandria, Va.

And some simply greeted those who were there to help.

Asad Ali, 9, with his mother Nazaahah, said hello to an Anne Arundel County police officer who was on duty.

David Simon, author of several books about life — and crime — on the streets of Baltimore and the writer/producer of the HBO series, “The Wire,” spoke out on Freddie Gray and the drug war — and threw out criticism of former Baltimore mayor Martin O’Malley, now a potential presidential candidate.

He said in a blog post on the Marshall Project page — The drug war began it, certainly, but the stake through the heart of police procedure in Baltimore was Martin O’Malley³. He destroyed police work in some real respects. Whatever was left of it when he took over the police department, if there were two bricks together that were the suggestion of an edifice that you could have called meaningful police work, he found a way to pull them apart.

At a news conference Wednesday outside Camden Yards, Gov. Larry Hogan (R) said Tuesday night’s curfew was a success.

“What happened last night was totally different from what happened Monday night,” he said. “Difference 24 hours makes … night and day.”

There was “very little violence, very few issues,” he said.

He thanked neighborhood and political leaders for helping enforce the curfew. “There were heroes out here in Baltimore City,” he said.

“The city is now safe,” he concluded.

Hogan, however, said he could not predict when the state of emergency would end.

“We’re going to take it day by day,” he said.

He said he was concerned about Friday, when a state prosecutor is set to receive a report from police on Freddie Gray’s death, as well as “planned activities” on Saturday.

“We can continue to maintain the peace, but we’re not going to rest until after we get through the weekend,” he said.

He said Tuesday night’s security plan involved a group effort between law enforcement agencies. Police were on the front lines and the National Guard came in with “overwhelming force” when “it started to get out of hand.”

He said 40 Humvees, troop carriers and helicopters were brought in “and everything disappeared within a matter of minutes.”

He said Baltimore police took the lead, and other law enforcement was there to back them up.

He spoke to U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch a couple times Tuesday night.

“City police did a great job,the mayor,” he added.

The D.C. group that organized rallies late last year in the wake of the police killings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner is planning its first rally for Freddie Gray on Wednesday night.

DCFerguson, a coalition of liberal organizations, expects hundreds of people to attend the rally, which has been promoted on social media, in support of Freddie Gray. Protesters will meet at 7 p.m. at the Gallery Place Metro station and march to the White House.

See the full story here.

Updated at 11:44 a.m.

It seems that activist Joseph Kent was not “kidnapped,” as some have said on social media. He was apparently arrested for having violated the city’s 10 p.m. curfew. A Baltimore-based lawyer, Stephen Beatty, claimed to have located Kent.

In a Twitter message, Steve Beatty — a Baltimore lawyer — said that Kent’s name is “not on the list of people being presented” for bail reviews. He also said “as a service to the community, I am continuing to make attempts to have his hearing with the commissioner expedited.” He noted that the “chaos” at the courthouse and processing of arrests is “making this a very slow process.”

He also clearly says that he is not representing Kent and calls himself a “concerned citizen/lawyer trying to help.

His latest post reads, “Fingers crossed.”

A call and message left for Beatty were not immediately returned.

Original post at 7:08 a.m.

There was much chatter on social media that activist Joseph Kent, a well-known local community organizer and student at Baltimore’s Morgan State University, was among those who were arrested overnight in Baltimore. The reports could not be independently verified early Wednesday.

But on Facebook and other outlets, users described Kent being “kidnapped” or “snatched” by law enforcement officials.

Baltimore police said late Tuesday night that 10 people were arrested but did not give specific details as to who was among those arrested.

Kent was quoted in a Baltimore City piece called “New leaders emerge out of Ferguson protests in Baltimore” last year.

“We been peaceful all day, and now everybody want to show your a—,” Kent said in the piece. “We’re not here for that.”

CNN video posted to Twitter appeared to show Kent “snatched,” in the words of one Twitter user, by police.

A few steps from what’s become known as the Baltimore riots’ “ground zero,” a sheet of paper has been taped to an exterior metal screen for a month.

“Rules of engagement,” the sign says. One of them: “Think before you act.” And another: “Never settle beef in public.”

The business belongs to Durwood Bush, who was born and raised in Baltimore. He calls his shop a “community store.” He sells stereos and teddy bears, purses and bleach. He still takes IOUs from people who can’t afford items until payday. He also uses his small space, which is on the first floor of a rowhouse, as a venue to preach and counsel.

He never feared the rioters would harm the shop.

“The ones from the neighborhood would protect us,” he said.

He understood why the violence erupted, but it still disappointed him.

Seven rules are listed on the sheet outside his shop. The last one says this: “Every argument isn’t war!”

The men in the bright orange T-shirts had come to collect remnants of the chaos, now stuffed in garbage bags and cardboard boxes.

“Trying to get some normalcy back,” Brian Smallwood, a city employee, said as he tossed a load into the back of a green garbage truck, which had stopped just feet from the epicenter of this week’s riots.

Smallwood, 55, was born in Baltimore and still recalls the violence that erupted after the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968.

“I was 8,” he said. “They burned the same place. Pennsylvania Avenue.”

Smallwood seethed as he thought of what happened here Monday. The destroyed businesses. The national embarrassment.

“It really hurt me to see this,” he said. “To see my city on fire.”

A Baltimore City Council member used a disparaging word in responding to those accused of violence in the unfolding unrest in the city.

Carl Stokes, who is black, was answering a CNN anchor’s questions about Baltimore’s Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake (D) using the word “thugs” to describe those who were looting and destroying the city in protests over the past few days.

The news anchor said, “Come on. . . . That’s a sense of right and wrong. They know it is wrong to steal and burn down a CVS and old people’s home. . . . I mean come on.”

Stokes responded, “Come on. . . . Calling them ‘thugs’? . . . Just call them n—–. Just call them n—–.”

Stokes’s comment have created a furor on social media.

Read the full story.

At Robert W. Coleman Elementary School, about half a mile from where the most violent riots erupted Monday night, kids returned to classes Wednesday — without any police in sight.

Schools, along with nearly everything else in Baltimore — including stores and some government agencies — had been closed on Tuesday.

Michelle Lewis watched from her van as her daughter, who is 7, walked past the school’s welcome sign and through its blue front doors on Wednesday morning. Afraid that the violence will continue, Lewis said she felt the children should have been kept home another day.

“I think it was too early because it’s not over yet,” she said.

Just blocks from the chaos, she and her family watched coverage of the mayhem Monday night as helicopters buzzed overhead.

“I couldn’t believe for it to be so close to home,” she said. “They’re not protesting. They’re stealing.”

Lewis was also disappointed that Baltimore’s Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake (D) didn’t call for help more quickly amid Monday’s bedlam.

“People would’ve had their businesses,” she said.

Campanella Fullwood, whose 7-year-old granddaughter attends the same school, agreed with the decision to reopen schools.

“I don’t see no reason to keep them out no longer,” Fullwood said, adding that rioters “ain’t messing with no kids.”

Lewis did acknowledge that, despite her reluctance, her daughter wanted to return.

On Wednesdays, she has art class.

Saturday’s protest, the first to turn violent, began at the corner of Presbury and N. Mount streets, just three blocks from what’s considered “ground zero.”

On Wednesday morning, it’s all quiet there now, save the noise of passing traffic. And on the stop sign that had become a makeshift memorial, the balloons have all deflated.

Protests weren’t just taking place in Baltimore.

In the District, D.C. Police said in a Twitter feed Tuesday night that demonstrators were at the intersection of 14th and U streets NW. There were some rolling street closures as a result.

Oakland’s ABC 7 reported that protesters gathered Tuesday in Oakland, Calif.

#Oakland demonstrators continue marching at 7th and 8th streets downtown in solidarity with #Baltimore. pic.twitter.com/XW22s8LMpZ

— ABC7 News (@abc7newsBayArea) April 29, 2015

Peaceful protest in downtown #Oakland. Brings out police barricade and helicopters. #baltimore #FreddieGray pic.twitter.com/YsniW1K07Q

— erica jue (@juebee) April 29, 2015

Just before 6 a.m., Baltimore’s downtown area appeared to return to normal.

Buses ran. Early morning commuters hit the road. Birds chirped. Schools would soon open.

But some things still weren’t exactly “normal.”

The streets are still filled with TV media crews and a heavy presence of law enforcement, including Baltimore police, other agencies and the National Guard. And the Orioles are scheduled to play a game today in an empty stadium at Camden Yards.

https://twitter.com/johnwoodrowcox/status/593348896094576640

Late Tuesday night, Baltimore police officials said they believe the curfew was a success.

“We do not have a lot of active movement throughout the city as a whole,” said Baltimore Police Commissioner Anthony Batts. According to the Associated Press, he said Baltimore “citizens are safe, the city is stable. We hope to maintain it that way.”

A total of 10 people were arrested after the curfew went into effect, police said. Two of them were arrested for looting, one for disorderly conduct, and seven for violating the city’s curfew.

In the early morning hours Wednesday, the CVS considered “ground zero” for some of the unrest was being boarded up. The intersection in that area was now open. It has been closed off and on with protesters and law enforcement at times.

After relative calm overnight Tuesday, there was not nearly as much to do. Just 24 hours before, volunteers had been cleaning up the intersection in front of the CVS where looters had once hit the store.

As 5 a.m. approached and the curfew lifted, the streets around Pennsylvania and North avenues showed few clear signs of change. Police stopped a handful of people and questioned why they were on city streets, but those en route to work were quickly allowed to leave.

Desert-colored military Humvees remain on post for blocks, even as police brought in replacement officers by bus. Vehicles traveled the streets without issues save for a slalom of traffic cones and trash bags strewn across nearby streets.

There were other remnants of chaos: broken glass ground into pavement, plus hundreds of smashed plastic bottles and overturned trash cans. The air remained filled with the acrid smell of smoke from the charred CVS store and the aftermath of canisters fired by police to disperse crowds late Tuesday.

After Monday’s violence and a relatively quiet Tuesday night, Baltimore schools will be open on Wednesday.

Schools to open on regular schedule on Wednesday, April 29. Read Dr. Thornton’s letter to the community: http://t.co/6tI3aI3qze

— Baltimore Schools (@BaltCitySchools) April 28, 2015

“Despite that it came after days of rising tension, yesterday’s violence felt like a shockwave across the city,” Gregory Thornton, CEO of Baltimore City Public Schools, wrote in a letter to the community Tuesday. “But I am writing to tell you that it will not overwhelm us. At this time, we are moving forward to open schools tomorrow as scheduled. With students, staff, family members, partners, volunteers, and community members, City Schools is more than 100,000 strong — and in the coming days and weeks we’ll be marshaling our strength in support of our students and a successful end to their school year.”

Baltimore police took four young people into custody at the corner of Pennsylvania and North avenues just before 4 a.m. Wednesday.

The four sat crossed-legged in flex cuffs as officers asked them why they had violated the curfew in the shadow of a burned-out CVS store.

Earlier, two Baltimore police officers stopped Thomas Wooden, 21, and Chase Jones, 19, and sat them on the North Avenue sidewalk to find out why they were on the street at 3 a.m., hours beyond curfew.

A female officer searched around the two young men with her flashlight; the interview process was swift and direct.

Where are you going? Where are you coming from?

The two East Side residents explained plainly: They had caught a bus to northwest neighborhoods to see the spectacle for themselves. They arrived about 9 p.m. and spent hours walking block after block, but found little resistance or problems with police.

“The two police was cool,” Jones said in an interview after police released them and directed them toward a bus line home.

“If you’re going about your business, they’re not going to press down on you. Just keep it moving,” Wooden said.

But the National Guardsmen, the pair found, had a different approach.

“They are the strict ones. They’re out here ready for war,” Jones said.

Wooden added that “They’re not being friendly, not answering questions. They’re out here for one specific reason — to shut down the city.”

Baltimore streets remained quiet in the 3 a.m. hour Wednesday.

National Guardsmen slung rifles across their chests or manned armored vehicles block by block near the epicenter of Monday’s rioting.

But police and the guardsmen challenged few people seen walking along sidewalks in the city’s northwestern neighborhoods.

At Mondawmin Mall, authorities ringed the perimeter of the sprawling campus. But a homeless man slept undisturbed in a bus shelter just a few feet from several guardsmen standing on post.

Oh my God. 00:18 mark. #JosephKent RT @HollyGoNightly1 Keep RTing this video. This needs national attention. pic.twitter.com/1ZyeQFnnJO

— Gabe Ortíz (@TUSK81) April 29, 2015

A protester some identified as Joseph Kent was arrested live on CNN late Tuesday. 

Kent, a student at Baltimore’s Morgan State University, was quoted extensively in a Baltimore City Paper piece called “New leaders emerge out of Ferguson protests in Baltimore” last year.

“We been peaceful all day, and now everybody want to show your a—,” Kent said in the piece. “We’re not here for that.”

CNN video posted to Twitter appeared to show Kent “snatched,” in the words of one Twitter user, by police.

My thoughts are with #JosephKent right now. I really hope he’s okay..

— Mary (@marrytoppp) April 29, 2015

Three hours into Baltimore’s curfew, the city appeared calm, with normally bustling areas around the Inner Harbor, the ballpark and Little Italy virtually deserted.

Maryland State troopers and National Guardsmen encircled harbor malls and businesses, but did not seem to approach the few people who waited at bus stops. A smattering of cars drove along streets with a few enterprising cab drivers fruitlessly searching for fares.

The cobblestones of Fells Point received zero pedestrians, and looked like a scene where a category 5 hurricane was forecast. Many businesses were boarded up, with plywood across plate glass and two-by-fours blocking doorways.

But boarding up came too late for Ravi Singh and the Broadway Mart convenience store. About an hour before curfew, Singh said he was closing the store when three young men with masks tried to enter.

“I refused to open for them,” Singh told The Post.

One of the young men flung a brick through the glass door. By 1 a.m., Singh was standing on the sidewalk supervising workmen repairing glass and boarding up the front of the store for the foreseeable future.

“I’m going to probably keep it up for a couple of days,” Singh said. “Whenever it gets peaceful.”

Chicago: Demonstrators begin sitting in the intersection of 55th and Cottage Grove Watch Live: http://t.co/MT0ZamkaQn pic.twitter.com/JbmY7ZfDGt

— NBC Chicago (@nbcchicago) April 29, 2015

Hundreds took to the streets of the Windy City in what was said to be a show of solidarity with protesters in Baltimore.

“Too many names have been turned into hashtags,” a Facebook page promoting the action read. “What is happening in Baltimore is not an isolated event. This did not start today, or yesterday or last month or with Ferguson or with Rodney King.”

“Who do you serve?” NBC 5 Chicago reported. “Who do you protect?”

The station reported at least one arrest at the scene.

Police squads moved out of the intersection Pennsylvania and North avenues just after midnight as squads were ordered to put their shields away. Officers milled about, some without riot helmets as they were relieved by small groups of National Guardsmen and police who stood on post at nearby intersections.

On side streets, lines of police cars patrolled streets and used loud speakers on squad cars to herd pedestrians toward their homes.

Armored personnel vehicles, from both local police departments and the National Guard, lined Pennsylvania Avenue.

As Baltimore waited to see whether it would see another night of rioting, there were reports of a shooting in the small Midwestern city that ignited a national debate about police shootings last year: Ferguson, Mo.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported a man in a group of about 50 protesters was shot in the leg near the epicenter of the protests that followed the Aug. 9 shooting of Michael Brown, a 18-year-old unarmed black man, by police officer Darren Wilson.

The man was “carried to safety,” the Post-Dispatch reported. Officers arrested a man in connection with the shooting and recovered a gun.

This post has been updated.

Baltimore Police Commissioner Anthony W. Batts said at a press conference shortly before midnight that 10 people had been arrested since 10 p.m., seven of them for violating the curfew.

The other three were arrested for disorderly conduct, looting and brandishing a weapon.

“We do not have a lot of activity or movement throughout the city as a whole, so the curfew is in fact working,” he said.

He said that National Guardsmen would be stationed for two to three blocks in each direction surrounding Pennsylvania and North avenues, the intersection that was the center of the demonstrations throughout the day and the site of the brief struggle between police and protesters after the curfew fell tonight.

At 9th and Patapsco in the southern part of the city, where youths were reportedly throwing rocks and injured one officer shortly before 10 p.m., two to four juveniles were arrested, Batts said. He did not know the injured officer’s condition.

Batts praised residents for the mostly peaceful protests before the curfew fell.

“There was music. There was dance. People had the conversations. We had officers stationed out there, but it was a very good event for the day,” he said.

Batts said police used pepper pellets and smoke bombs to clear the crowd at Pennsylvania and North. He said officers were being hit by some rocks as they pushed the crowd back.

That intersection is now clear, and Batts said he planned on deploying National Guard in a two to three block radius to hold the intersection.

Batts said that someone brandished a weapon at an officer on Hillen Street in East Baltimore, but apparently did not fire. That person escaped.

“The citizens are safe,” Batts said. “The city is stable. We hope to keep it that way.”

He added that this afternoon up to 15 young men and women showed up to apply to be Baltimore police officers.

As the second day of tension in Baltimore continues with police striving to enforce the city-imposed curfew, here’s an interactive look back at the unfolding protests and an exploration of the neighborhood that Freddie Gray lived in.

The fire, by the library, was small and is now extinguished.

A small fire has been started. Police responded with more gas.

Police used pepper balls at the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues just before 10:30 pm.

At the time, the crowd seemed to be mostly reporters, though perhaps several dozen protesters, some wearing bandanas over their faces, had also gathered.

The intersection itself is calm now, though it is possible demonstrators have moved elsewhere.

There’s smoke in the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues. It’s not clear whether police, protesters or both threw the projectiles that caused it.

When the police first moved forward, about half the residents left the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues. About 40 to 50 protesters are still standing there.

Police have moved about 40 feet, into the middle of the intersection, as protesters have thrown bottles and glass and shouted expletives.

At 10:15 p.m., the police moved forward about 10 steps, prompting dozens of young people still in the street to scatter. As volunteers ran to try to shield the residents, several bottles and rocks flew at the officers, hitting their riot shields.

Earlier, about five minutes after the curfew began at 10 p.m., Rep. Elijah Cummings spoke from a loudspeaker to urge the crowd to leave.

“There is nothing wrong with peaceful protest,” Cummings said. “We all need to go home.”

At 10:12, a helicopter overhead warned that the curfew was in place, and that everyone must leave.

“All news media, please clear the area,” the police helicopter’s message said, although reporters had been told by police earlier that they would not be arrested for staying out past the curfew. “You must go home or you are subject to arrest.”

Three men were being handcuffed on the corner of 10th and Patapsco at 10:10 p.m.

Baltimore police said that people threw objects, injuring an officer, near that intersection.

A helicopter is now asking people to clear area and saying people will be subject to arrest if they don’t leave.

U.S. Rep. Elijah Cummings is now here too.

About 200 people, including reporters, are still in the street.

At the intersection of 9th and Patapsco, where an officer was reportedly injured, all is quiet except for a crowd in line for purchases at Citgo food mart.

A large police presence gathered a block south, at the District Court building, including two armed personnel vehicles which left at about 10 pm.

Small groups of men walk along the sidewalk without the police stopping them.

Reporter John Woodrow Cox is at Pennsylvania and North avenues:

When the clock struck 10, almost no one reacted. Police made no announcements. Protesters didn’t scurry away. The throng of media remained waiting.

At least 200 people, including reporters, are still in the intersection.

Baltimore police Capt. Eric Kowalczyk said a “situation is unfolding” with an injured officer in the southern district of the city at 10th and Patapsco. He said no further information is available.

He said police definitely intend to enforce the 10 p.m. curfew, and that they will do so with discretion, making exceptions for individuals in certain circumstances such as medical emergencies and commuting late to or from work.

At 10 p.m. when the curfew was set to go into effect, images on TV showed significant numbers of people still standing in the street and police lined up across from them, but not moving to make arrests immediately.

“Baltimore is burning,” Hillary Clinton said at a New York City fundraiser today.

“It is heartbreaking,” the presidential candidate and former secretary of state added. “The tragic death of another young African-American man. The injuries to police officers. The burning of peoples’ homes and small businesses. We have to restore order and security. But then we have to take a hard look as to what we need to do to reform our system.”

By 9:40 p.m., twenty minutes before the city-imposed curfew, there were still more than 100 people in the street. It is unclear if volunteers will succeed in fully clearing the crowd, which consists of both locals and out-of-towners.

Crowds were gathered all day at the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues, where a burned-out CVS served as ground zero for protests.

Soon after 9 p.m., a group of dozens of volunteers, some in clergy’s clothing and others young men who described themselves as gang members, began pushing their way through the crowd. As they reached the police line, they locked arms, and insisted the crowds move back and away from the police.

“Bet you never thought you’d see the Bloods and the Crips do this,” said one volunteer, a red bandana covering his face.

But after they moved the crowd back a few feet, a single water bottle was thrown over their heads and landed at the feet of the officers, who immediately raised their shields and prepared to respond.

“No, no, no,” shouted several of the volunteers as they rushed back to the police line, insisting the officers not engage.

When they didn’t, the volunteers again locked arms and pushed the crowd and media back more than a block from the police line, urging everyone to go home.

“Let’s show America that we don’t need police to police us, we can disperse ourselves,” urged State Senator Catherine Pugh, whose voice came from a loudspeaker just behind the police line. “Let’s disperse peacefully.”

“We had to come to show that black lives matter, that this is about more than Freddie Gray,” said Lakeisha Shuey, 18, who drove from Harrisburg, Pa., to join the demonstration. “Ninety-nine percent of these protests have been peaceful, so it’s important to be out here highlighting and showing that.”

Former mayor Kurt Schmoke told The Post’s Frances Stead Sellers: “Baltimore is a tale of two cities. There are really wonderful areas. There’s some architecture and design that represent the best in the country. There are also pockets of poverty that represent real challenges for us all. What you saw [Monday] night was a combination of frustration of those people and opportunism of those who were taking advantage of the situation… I’m a little skeptical about the extent to which underlying social problems gave rise to what happened last night.”

Read the full interview here.

Baltimore City Police radio just relayed to all units on the air the details of the curfew in the city, set to start at 10 p.m. and continue through 5 a.m.

The radio announcement said starting at 9 p.m. and continuing in 15-minute intervals until 10, police would use public address systems—they previously said that that included bullhorns—to announce the impending curfew.

A woman on a police bullhorn urged people at Pennsylvania and North avenues to go home. “We will continue our peaceful demonstration by showing America that we know how to police ourselves. Take your children home and abide by the curfew.”

Men waded into the crowd shouting, “Go home, go home.”

Some are leaving, but others are not listening.

As 9 p.m. came, the mood turned tense. A line of people who had been standing directly in front of police to keep the peace tried to push the crowd back, but as they did, a skirmish broke out.

It was quickly resolved, but many seem frustrated that few are dispersing with curfew approaching. One man yelled at a photographer, “You don’t live here. We live here. Move!”

Gov. Larry Hogan announced a new Web site on Tuesday night that will tell Marylanders about ways to volunteer in Baltimore clean-up efforts and donate to local charities.

The Web site, MarylandUnites.org, also promises updates from law enforcement agencies and state officials.

“We have received an outpouring of support from Marylanders and people all around the country who want to help get our beloved Baltimore back on its feet in the wake of the violence and destruction,” Hogan said in a statement. “I encourage everyone to do what they can to assist Charm City at this difficult time.”

The Web site currently offers links to donate to the local branches of the Salvation Army, Red Cross, United Way and Associated Black Charities.

It also includes a form for people interested in volunteering to fill out. Someone from the governor’s office will contact the would-be volunteers, the Web site says.

Toyia Groomes, 36, said she wanted to show her city’s youth “there’s other ways to channel negative energy.” So she called friend Troy Long, and the two hatched an idea: Bring a little “Snap City” skating to the gathering at Pennsylvania and North avenues.

The pair assembled several of their friends who skate together at the Shake & Bake Family Fun Center. And in the heart of hundreds of demonstrators and police, they blasted music and danced on roller skates.

Long, 46, of Baltimore, said he wanted to “add a little excitement” to the mix, but they did have a message.

“The message is, we’re trying to show a positive light on the news right now,” he said.

Damion Harris, 42, a tech company owner who was among the skaters, said he felt the group was helping Baltimore recover.

“We didn’t want to wait two weeks for Baltimore to start healing,” said Harris, whose friends refer to him as Day-Day. “We wanted Baltimore to start healing today.”

During a town hall meeting at the Empowerment Temple in West Baltimore,  Rev. Jamal Bryant gave the microphone to people from all walks of life who were asked to express their frustration.

One person who talked was Essence, a 16-year-old who attends Frederick Douglass High School. She broke down in tears as she talked about her life at school. “The police harass so many students. They don’t care. Nobody cares. It is so hard to get through school. ”

After the teenager spoke, Bryant called members of Zeta Phi Beta sorority to help her.

She was one of many people to talk at the town hall meeting. Another mother with a baby screamed “Help! We need help!”

A few dozen people have locked arms, forming a barrier in front of the police line at Pennsylvania and North avenues.

Neil Jennings, 34, of Baltimore, who works in logistics, said he was standing in the line “for peace.”

“We’re policing our own,” he said. “We want to show the nation that what they saw yesterday, that’s not Baltimore.”

Derrick Compton Sr., 50, a community organizer from Baltimore, said he had been out since before noon trying to send the same message. As for what would happen when the 10 p.m. curfew rolls around, he said, “We’ll disperse and do what we have to do.”

Having cut a European trip short, former Baltimore Mayor Martin O’Malley appeared Tuesday evening at the scene of ongoing protests here, a few feet from a CVS that was looted and burned on Monday.

“You have to be present when we’re living through the pain,” said O’Malley (D), who after his time as mayor spent two terms as Maryland governor and is now a potential 2016 presidential candidate. “Everyone’s needed right now in the city. Everyone needs to step up.”

O’Malley displayed a wide smile as he shook hands and posed for selfies with some residents, as a team of aides worked to keep both reporters and residents from questioning the man whose administration’s zero-tolerance policing policies led to widespread arrests that some say disproportionately affected black and low-income residents.

“F— that, this is his fault,” screamed a man who followed along on a red motorcycle as O’Malley and the crowd that surrounded him moved down the street. “Do you know who he is? Why would you shake his hand?”

In an interview with the Post, the man identified himself as Wayne Grady, a lifelong Baltimore resident. “He had his chance to fix this,” Grady said. “He’s part of the frustrations that are built up in these black young men…. That’s why central booking was so crowded, because he started the policies.”

While he spoke briefly with reporters, O’Malley declined to discuss his record on crime and policing as mayor at length.

“Every mayor does their very best to strike the right balance, to save as many lives as we possibly can,” O’Malley said. “And every mayor since my time there has tried to do that as well. We’re a safer city than we were, but we still have a lot of work to do, you know?”

Some of the protesters who have taken to the streets point to a “zero-tolerance” policing policy implemented under O’Malley as the root of the community’s distrust of the police. Under the program, arrests skyrocketed, in many cases for minor crime or no crime at all — at one point topping 100,000.

“What we had zero tolerance for was police misconduct,” O’Malley said. “We worked at it everyday. When we had the long hot summer and talked about taking back our open air drug markets –”

O’Malley was then interrupted as two of his handlers got into a physical altercation with a broadcast journalist attempting to keep up with the scrum. The former mayor had to intervene, letting out an “oh, come on, guys” as he extended his hand to calm his aides.

“I mean, we had a long summer,” O’Malley continued. “And we talked about the fact that we have to police our corners and police our police.”

O’Malley then approached a street musician and local community resident who called out to him.

The resident asked if O’Malley wanted to really work to solve the problem of police brutality, and when the former mayor said yes, the man asked how he could get in touch.

O’Malley fiddled for a few seconds — he didn’t have any business cards on him, and neither did any of his aides.

As reporters offered him pens and paper to write down his number for the resident, an O’Malley aide finally located a business card.

Moments later, O’Malley was guided into the passenger seat of a black SUV and whisked away.

It briefly got tense at Pennsylvania and North avenues when a column of police in riot gear waded into the crowd. Cries of “f— the police” rang out as people swarmed around them.

Then calm was restored, after people realized the police were helping a protester who had collapsed of an apparent seizure. The police drove an armored truck to the person, and the crowd parted so an ambulance could get through.

About three dozen men lined up across Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the line of police in riot gear, facing what is now a peaceful group massed at Pennsylvania and North avenues, the center of Monday’s riot.

“We’re not here to protect the police,” said David Whitaker, one of the men in line. “We’re here to make sure things don’t out of hand. Black men standing up. To make sure things don’t get out of hand, and so police don’t get out of hand.”

Streets in downtown Baltimore are mostly quiet, as dozens of state police officers and National Guardsmen, some toting long guns, are stationed in clusters near the Baltimore Convention Center and other tourist attractions near the Inner Harbor.

For some, the sight was reassuring. “It’s unfortunate, but it had to happen,” said Larry Strong, who was visiting Baltimore with his wife, Susan, from California. “I must say, it feels good to have the protection,” Susan Strong added.

The couple arrived in Baltimore on Saturday evening, just as the first signs of unrest began to emerge. Congestion caused by protesters prevented their cab from moving through traffic, forcing them to walk the last few blocks to their hotel near Oriole Park at Camden Yards. And since the violence began Monday, many of the restaurants and attractions they planned to visit have been shuttered. “We have had a hard time finding things that are open,” Larry said. “But we still love what we see of Baltimore. It is a beautiful city.”

Others thought the law enforcement presence was a bit much. “It’s intimidating; the last thing we need is this,” said Whitney Chase, 27, a Baltimore native who teaches in an after-school arts program at Baltimore’s Dunbar High School. “It feels a little like martial law.”

A group of young protesters climbed to the top of a cement structure for a flag pole in front of Baltimore’s city hall.

The group insisted they were peaceful and vented their frustration using a bullhorn and chants. But as mounted police arrived at the intersection of Fayette and Holliday streets, the rhetoric became more heated.

The crowd moved toward the police. Screams and yells emanated while others yelled from behind them, “This is a peaceful protest.”

At the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues, where hundreds have gathered near the burned-out CVS, a police helicopter is circling. At about 7:30 p.m., someone yelled down at a few people sitting on top of a Metro station roof: “Please get off of the roof. Thank you.”

The six or so people there complied immediately.

Baltimore police spokesman Capt. Eric Kowalczyk said that police have perceived an “increase in anger” among the crowd growing at Pennsylvania and North avenues, the epicenter of the demonstrations.

Police are deploying more officers to the area but have information that another group is headed downtown, Kowalczyk said. He said they have no reason to believe the group is gathering for any other reason than a peaceful protest.

Police are enforcing the 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew but said they are exercising discretion for individuals who may have to work or are traveling to and from the airport. A violation of the curfew is a criminal offense.

Under the state of emergency, the Baltimore police commissioner has the authority to issue a 24-hour juvenile curfew, but Kowalczyk said they have chosen not to do so.

Hundreds of people just left Pennsylvania and North avenues chanting, “We love Baltimore. We want peace.”

They’re marching north up Pennsylvania Avenue in good spirits, children holding hands with mothers. “Nice and peaceful,” one mother said to her son.

It’s not one organized group, and leaders are trying to make a loop through the Penn North neighborhood to a basketball court where a youth ministry is set up.

“This is to end black-on-black killings,” said Michael Williams, one of the marchers, as an armored police vehicle passed by without incident. “This is to end all killings. Police killing us.”

A group of six musicians calling themselves the Baltimore Brass Factory spent Tuesday afternoon playing jazz at the intersection of North and Pennsylvania avenues, breaking up the constant hum of crowd chatter with familiar tunes.

“It’s the healing of music,” said band member Clarence Ward III, who played the trumpet. “That’s how I can best help people get their mind off the negativity. It’s all about putting some love in the air.”

Ward then started a rendition of “When the Saints Go Marching In,” inspiring the crowd to sing along at times.

Among the businesses closing during the unrest in Baltimore, the Horseshoe Casino said it would close between 9 p.m. and 8 a.m. each day this week, while the curfew is in effect.

The casino, which opened in the city’s Inner Harbor area in August, was trumpeted as a money-maker that would draw tourists to Maryland.

Martin O’Malley joined protesters in Baltimore, where some heckled him and confronted him about his record enforcing strict police policies when he was the city’s mayor.

Asked by TV reporters about people who had told him to get out, O’Malley said, “Most people have been very nice to me. You’ve gotta to be present in the middle of the pain, man.”

“Look, every mayor does their very best to strike the right balance, to save as many lives as we possibly can,” he said. “We’re a safer city than we were, but we still have a lot of work to do.”

Debates broke out all around the intersection of North and Pennsylvania avenues as the sun began to go down.

Among them was one between a middle-aged black man and woman and a slightly younger-looking black man. All three screamed their points as a ring of about 20 people and a row of police officers in riot gear watched silently.

The man and woman, who stood with a child of about 10, argued that black people were hurting themselves by torching the CVS, which was a few feet away. The other man argued that the CVS represented white-owned outside domination and exploitation of African-Americans. The back-and-forth was heated, with interruptions and insults.

“Black people are working to destroy the things we built!” the woman said.

“We didn’t build that CVS! We don’t own that!” the man said. “This is the way white people fuel oppression.”

Fifteen minutes later, the three were still debating furiously. The crowd stood and listened without a sound.

Maya Camille, 23, led about 200 people outside Amazing Grace Lutheran Church in East Baltimore in a group prayer, song and conversation about the unrest in the city.

She encouraged the crowd to use the hashtag #baltimoreloves to counter #baltimoreriots, because “My city can riot, but my city can also love,” she said. “Baltimore, like, loves harder than any place, any time, any space, because it has struggled like no other place has.”

The church is a block away from Monument Street, where some businesses were looted on Monday. Camille is a member of the church and a leader in a McElderry Park community organization.

Gen. Linda Singh, the adjutant general of the Maryland National Guard, said that the National Guard had activated 1,700 troops in less than 24 hours, an unusually speedy activation of so many people.

“That should say to you, to the city of Baltimore, how important it is,” Singh said. “We are extremely professional in the way we are going to handle our events and the way we deal with our communities in general.”

At the same news conference, Gov. Larry Hogan (R) said that law enforcement officers, including officers from as far away as Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia, had made more than 250 arrests Monday and Tuesday.

Hogan said he did not know how long National Guardsmen would remain in Baltimore. “We’re going to keep them here as long as is necessary. We don’t know at this point how long that’s going to be.”

Among the hundreds of people at North and Pennsylvania avenues, Megan Kenney carried a sign against police violence — and a broom.

Kenny, a 38-year-old educator from Baltimore, said she had been cleaning the streets all day.

“What I saw last night was an expression of pain,” she said. “These are kids. They’re children.”

As two men debated, she swept the street around them.

Their faces an inch or two apart, one man wore a baseball cap and a jacket saying “Vietnam veteran,” and the other wore a polo shirt. Last night, members of the crowd said, the man in the baseball cap was telling people to go home. The other man was calling for the crowd to fight on.

A circle of about 20 people, mostly young African American men, stood around, watching as the two older black men debated. The crowd around was roaring and it was hard to hear. On the other side of the cluster, a small group was playing tambourine and trumpet.

The man in the vet garb said, “Hands up! Peace!” He put his palms up to the bright blue sky. Then he appeared to say he felt disrespected.

The man in the polo shirt said: “I respect you. If it wasn’t for people like you I wouldn’t be here. But: Fists up!”

The circle of younger men around them roared, “Fists up!” They raised their fists. “Fists up! Fuck peace! If you’re scared, go home!”

Behind the cluster was a row of some 30 police in riot gear — shields, masks, helmets, plastic cuffs, sticks and apparent body armor.

The Baltimore Orioles will be playing out of public view Wednesday, but not so the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.

Orchestra musicians have announced a free concert at noon Wednesday “in support of our community” outside of the Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall at 1212 Cathedral St.

Longtime Baltimore City Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke was, late Tuesday afternoon, still eagerly awaiting the arrival of the National Guard.

Clarke (D) represents a north-central district that includes a hardware store and shoe shop targeted during the riots.

“It was an exercise in looting,” she said.  “They were taking lots of shoes, and they went into Ace Hardware. They really trashed it, except it’s open for business today.”

Clarke said some shop owners decided to hold off on reopening.

“Some are waiting to make sure that we have settled into a peaceful time,” she said.

The arrival of the National Guard should provide that sense of reassurance, Clarke said, but as of late afternoon, she had not seen them in her district. Clarke said that she had requested the Guard first thing Tuesday morning, but “that’s controlled by the governor’s office.”

Despite some early signs of tension between Gov. Larry Hogan and Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, Clarke said city and state officials seemed to be working smoothly together when she visited the city’s emergency operations center earlier in the day. So she remained hopeful that the guard was on its way.

“I’m looking forward to seeing them on Greenmount Avenue, like the flowers in May,” she said, “And like the flowers in May, they’ll fade and go back to their regular job as soon as we turn this corner. But we’re very grateful.”

Maj. Steve Ward, commander of the East Baltimore District of the Baltimore Police Department, offered Connie Lee bottles of water as she stood in the doorway of her trashed check-cashing business.

“They busted the glass and took the ATM machine around the corner, where they busted it open,” said  Lee as she looked at the badly damaged machine.

Lee started working at the Baltimore Service Center in 1989, and after more than 20 years of being an employee, in 2011 she had saved up enough money to buy the company.

Kevin Laws, Lee’s friend, said: “What they have done has taken us back 20 years.” Rondy McCown, another friend of Lee, added: “I think that it is sad. They took protest to a whole new level.”

A line of Maryland State Police troopers held plexiglass shields and batons outside the Baltimore Service Center and the other businesses in the 2300 block of East Monument Street.

A state police armored vehicle was parked in front of the business, and a helicopter flew above the block, but  most of the stores were closed.

Holly Bird was one of the many people who cashed her checks at Lee’s business. “This is a shame. Black people own these businesses,” she said.

Shortly before 5 p.m., a glass company truck arrived. Workers began to remove the glass and board up Lee’s business.

But she said the looters have not killed her dream.”I plan to move next door,” Lee said. “We are going to make it.”

At a news conference Tuesday afternoon, Baltimore Police Commissioner Anthony W. Batts said that he had an answer to people who asked of the police department Monday afternoon when violence started breaking out, “Why didn’t you move faster?”

“Because they’re 14-, 15- , and 16-year-old kids out there. Do you want people using force on 14- , 15- , 16-year-old kids?” Batts said. “They’re old enough to be accountable but they’re still kids.”

He said that Tuesday, so far, had been “an okay day.” Some businesses had been robbed Tuesday, but overall police saw few problems. He mentioned the intersection where a CVS was burned Monday and where hundreds gathered Tuesday afternoon. “I was very pleased to see at North and Pennsylvania, we had dancing, we had people celebrating, we had people bringing calm and peace,” he said, though he added that two people were arrested there Tuesday.

“When you’re from Baltimore, you’re from Baltimore as something that’s in your DNA,” Batts said. “My officers … they love Baltimore too. I had officers come up to me and say, ‘I was born and raised in this city. This makes me cry.’ ”

At the same news conference, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said:  “Last night was a very rough period for our city, but today I think we saw a lot more of what Baltimore is about. We saw people coming together to claim our city, to clean our city and to help to heal our city.”

And Batts also talked about reforming the police department.

“It’s clear that what we have to do is change the culture within the Baltimore Police Department. It’s something that was started on two and a half years ago,” Batts said. He said officers had started reading to schoolchildren and coaching youth sports teams. “We have more to do. But we can’t do it this way, by destroying this beautiful city.”

A sign posted at the burned CVS, which residents continue to walk into today:

Kids, adults and professional photographers are all passing through the burned-out CVS just to check out the damage and take pictures.

Inside, a small team continues to clean out the store. Enrique and Sarah, who did not want to share their last names, went looking for supplies to help clean up. “But I guess all the mops and brooms got looted,” Sarah said.

Instead they found someone’s prescription bottle of Bisacodyl, covered in sludge. They took it, saying maybe they would find the owner.

Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) delivered a sharply worded speech Tuesday calling for criminal justice reform and a robust jobs agenda in the wake of riots in Baltimore.

“No American should ever feel like their life is not valued,” Reid said.

Reid decried the violence that has wracked Baltimore. But he was deeply critical of the police department’s handling of its relations with poor inner-city residents. “Let’s not pretend the system is fair, let’s not pretend everything is okay,” Reid  said.

Read more of this story on Post Politics.

As of about 4:30 p.m., there has been no hint of rioting outside of Security Square Mall, where violence was threatened on social media.

There are a few dozen people here — some onlookers, some youths, some religious leaders and some advocating a cause. They are mingling casually, a few even clapping and singing.

Just after 4 p.m., nearly everyone joined hands as Bishop Michael Watson of the Church of God and Christ led the group in a prayer. “We ask now for your peace, oh God,” he said.

Gray Michael Parsons of Owings Mills and Eric Gordon, 47, of Windsor Mill stood side by side holding signs — Gordon’s said “Jobs, Justice, and Education;” Parsons’s said “All Life Matters.”

Late last night, after watching the riots tear apart parts of Baltimore, an anti-violence activist named Carmichael “Stokey” Cannady picked up the phone. He had to do something, he thought. So he starting doing what he does best. He organized.

The result of those first few calls played out before roughly 400 people at a basketball court less than a mile from where rioters looted and torched a CVS on Monday.

“I rationalized with myself and said, ‘I got to get people together,’ ” Cannady called out to the crowd, which had gathered to focus on positivity and community. “Because now we’re talking about a burned building rather than a life that was lost.”

The goal of the rally was to use sports as a way to attract youths who might otherwise be attracted to the protests. Judging by the size of the crowd, the organizers had some success. Teenagers darted through the crowd and played basketball.

One such youth was 13-year-old Cameron Jefferies, who said he joined the protests near the CVS for an hour, but got scared. “It’s peaceful here,” he said. “I feel protected. I didn’t feel protected before.”

That’s exactly what Cannady was hoping for. “No one is fighting here,” he said. “Ain’t no police here. This here has got to be a good thing.”

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan’s scheduled Friday fundraiser for New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a fellow blue-state Republican and likely presidential contender, has been canceled.

“The Hogan event on May 1 has been canceled. Will be rescheduled for a later date,” said Samantha Smith, an adviser to Christie’s political-action committee, in an e-mail Tuesday.

The delayed Annapolis event, a rare foray into the national political scene by the first-term governor, was seen as a sign of Hogan’s unsurprising and early support for Christie’s potential bid for the 2016 Republican nomination.

During Hogan’s 2014 race, Christie was an enthusiastic backer and helped propel Hogan’s underdog victory with a series of appearances and funding secured from the Republican Governors Association, which Christie chaired at the time.

Hogan was set to pay back the favor, appearing with Christie at a luncheon reception at the Loews Annapolis Hotel to raise money for Leadership Matters for America, Christie’s PAC. Tickets were listed at $2,500 per person; access to the “VIP photo reception” cost $5,000.

The working title for Matthew Crenson’s latest book asks a question, one that the riots might seem to answer: “Baltimore: Mobtown or Charm City?”

Crenson, a Johns Hopkins University political scientist, had intended to end his political history of the city on an upbeat note, in the 1980s, when then-Mayor William Donald Schaefer (D) helped Baltimore shed the “Mobtown” reputation that had dogged it since the War of 1812.

Now 850 pages into his project, he plans an epilogue to cover the riots.

“It’s really a very unusual kind of situation,” he said. “We have essentially a race riot confronting a city government that at the top levels is entirely African-American. It’s a case of disconnection between political leadership and the people in the street. … The people who really did the best work last night to bring things back under control were not so much the city officials or the police, for that matter. It was the black ministers who see those people at noon every Sunday.”

The mayor’s demeanor is part of the problem, said Crenson, who described Stephanie Rawlings-Blake (D) as unexpressive and seemingly distant.

“That’s the face she always seems to project — no matter what’s going on — there’s this impassivity,” he said. “That might be interpreted as calm collectedness or maybe just an inability to connect. And I’m beginning to think it’s more of the latter than the former.”

The Rev. Al Sharpton gave a brief speech in front of Baltimore City Hall on Tuesday afternoon, urging demonstrators to refrain from violence but saying the public should not condemn residents for the anger they have shown.

“Young people’s frustration is something that we can expect, but we do not condone it being done in a violent way,” he said. “Every brick thrown is a potential roadblock to justice for Freddie Gray.”

Sharpton added that the community should focus on fairness and justice: “We’re fighting violence, not adding to it.”

A group of African American lawyers also spoke at City Hall, addressing what they described as the underlying causes of the unrest in Baltimore.

Attorney Aisha Braveboy criticized the Maryland legislature for failing to pass 17 police-reform bills this year that would have addressed issues ranging from transparency with the disciplinary process to delays in releasing information to the public.

Braveboy, a former state delegate in Maryland representing Prince George’s County, called for a special legislative session to consider the measures, noting that former governor Martin O’Malley once took such action for gambling measures.

“If that was important enough to call back the legislature, then the lives of Baltimore citizens are at least as important,” added Braveboy, who ran unsuccessfully for attorney general last year.

Malik Shabazz, president of Black Lawyers for Justice, called for massive investments in Baltimore’s most impoverished neighborhoods.

“If there was $60 million in damages [from the riots], let’s have $60 BILLION to invest in this community,” he said.

Barricades and dozens of National Guard troops, state troopers and Baltimore police in riot gear ringed City Hall.

Grace Lyo owns four convenience stores in West Baltimore, one of which burned down last night.

She called the police after her alarm company called, she said, but “they don’t have the power, actually.” Lyo said she feels safer now that the National Guard is out.

Her store that burned was called “Rising Sun” in Korean. “They need the sun rising,” she said of the people in her neighborhood.  “Sometimes they are so hard.”

She was keeping her remaining businesses open Tuesday, she said — she needs the money. She stood outside one of her markets at Moser and N. Mount, and neighbors reassured her. “The kids won’t burn this store. They like this store,” one woman said as she walked out.

Right now, the crowd at Pennsylvania and North avenues is ignoring the police to watch a few bikers do tricks.

The smoke at the nearby CVS, which burned on Monday and appeared to be burning again Tuesday, has been stopped.

As violence flared up in pockets of Baltimore on Monday, the city’s mayor had some strong words for those participating in the riots.

One word in particular stuck out: “Thugs.”

It was a word that Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake later said she regretted using.

Read more from a lexicographer on the changing meaning of the word “thug” on Morning Mix.

Just before 3 p.m., five police cars sped past Security Square Mall. They were apparently headed to nearby Woodcliff Avenue, where by the time a reporter arrived, Baltimore County officers had handcuffed two young black males against their squad cars.

A neighbor who was interviewed by police said he watched as one officer drew his gun on the pair and order them to put their hands up. “They stopped immediately,” he said, and seemed to be relaxed as officers dealt with them.

Two neighbors said police told them the two young males matched the description of some people who had just robbed a nearby pit beef shop. The neighbors said police were searching the neighborhood for a weapon, and as they spoke to a reporter, officers could be seen looking through the mailboxes and yards of nearby homes.

The neighbors said even though the incident did not seem connected to any rioting, it was nonetheless uncomfortable.

“I’ve never seen anything like that, and I hope I never have to see it again,” one said.

Andrew Tucker and Delores Gaither took advantage of a day off and great weather to have lunch at the Cheesecake Factory at the Inner Harbor.

They were enjoying the sun while seated on a bench outside when they learned that the restaurant was closing early in light of threats of more rioting and violence.

But to Tucker, the shutting down of Inner Harbor businesses is not about safety. “It’s just a diversion,” the 56-year-old retiree said. Closing down businesses, “is just to take focus away from the real issue.”

Tucker began to vent his frustration over what he believes is an overblown reaction by leaders to the outburst, which he concedes is wrong, of young people who feel targeted by law enforcement.

The deployment of law enforcers, he says, follows a pattern that was seen in Ferguson, Mo., in which leaders allow the kids to be carried away in order to draw attention to the destruction but not “the guy’s life that was taken.”

Gaither, who is a cook at Johns Hopkins University (which also closed early Tuesday), chimed in: “They don’t want to talk about the real issues,” she said. The youth are “acting out because they are the ones suffering. Protests and marches won’t do anything so they had to make a statement.”

While she said she doesn’t condone the looting and said there was no doubt individuals took advantage of the situation, Gaither said she understands it. And it wasn’t only the rioters who were opportunists. Police, she said, could have stopped it earlier.

“Now we are focused on the kids’ actions and not at police actions,” Gaither said.

Tucker would like to see city leaders meet soon with neighborhood representatives to talk through the problems. But having troops in the city’s tourist areas does nothing for dialogue, he said.

“I am not in fear of those kids,” he said. “I am in fear of those guys standing out there,” referring to the National Guard.

Baltimore firefighters have responded to the CVS at the corner of Pennsylvania and West North avenues which burned on Monday.

Light smoke could be seen coming from roof, but no visible flames. A ladder truck has a ladder deployed over the roof.