Protesters in front of Oakland City Hall on Wednesday night in the wake of Iraq veteran Scott Olsen's critical wounding by a police teargas canister. Photograph: Kimihiro Hoshino/AFP/Getty
At a police news conference in Oakland on Wednesday night, police chief Howard Jordan said the events leading up to Olsen's injury would be investigated as vigorously as a fatal police shooting, according to Associated Press.
"It's unfortunate it happened. I wish that it didn't happen. Our goal, obviously, isn't to cause injury to anyone," Jordan said.
Yesterday a source at the Oakland police citizen's review board told the Guardian it would be looking into the circumstances surrounding Olsen's injury. The board will announce whether it will conduct its own investigation over the next couple of days.
Good morning, welcome to the Guardian's rolling coverage of the Occupy movement.
Much of the interest today focusses on Occupy Oakland, where Scott Olsen, a 24-year-old Iraq war veteran, remains in hospital after allegedly being hit by a police projectile.
The last update on Olsen's condition came at 10.30pm PDT, 1.30am ET last night, when doctors told friends that he remained in a critical condition.
Olsen's parents are flying from Wisconsin today to be at his bedside, as doctors continue to assess whether he will need surgery.
Last night protesters returned to downtown Oakland, California, to demand the resignation of the city's mayor and an investigation to explain how Olsen received his injuries.
My colleague Andrew Gumbel was with protesters in Oakland.
About 2,000 people ? half as many as Tuesday night ? massed in front of City Hall on Wednesday, tearing down a steel barricade intended to keep them off the grass in Frank Ogawa Plaza.
When the city closed down a nearby underground station, preventing dispersing protesters going home, they organised a spontaneous march through the centre of the city, chanting: "Whose streets? Our streets!"
[...]
Police had been under orders to let them have the run of the plaza until 10pm. Officers stood guard at junctions in patrol cars and motorbikes to deter people from jumping up on to an overhead freeway. The police were more lowkey than on Tuesday, when they manned barricades around the plaza and fired volley after volley of teargas that filled the surrounding streets and smoked out businesses.
As the protest continued late into the night both sides appeared afraid of engaging the other. Many marchers wore scarves over their noses and mouths in anticipation of teargas. Some had gas masks.
When officers wanted the crowd to move out of a traffic intersection they sent an ambulance in with its siren blaring, not a police vehicle.
One sign taped to a lamppost delivered this message to the police: "You've fuelled our fire."
Speaker after speaker demanded the resignation or recall of the city's mayor, Jean Quan, who had initially voiced her support of the protesters. "Mayor Quan you did more damage to Oakland in one evening than Occupy Oakland did in two weeks," said one slogan scrawled near the entrance to her offices.
Follow live updates here on protests in Oakland, Wall Street and elsewhere.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/blog/2011/oct/27/occupy-oakland-police-live
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