FERGUSON: Demonstrators in Ferguson, Missouri, on Saturday marked two weeks since a white police officer shot dead an unarmed black teenager, while authorities reported no arrests overnight among the pockets of protesters who marched and chanted in intense heat.
The St. Louis suburb has had three consecutive relatively calm nights after daily turmoil since Michael Brown, 18, was shot by Ferguson officer Darren Wilson on Aug. 9.
Authorities have reported barely a dozen arrests over the last three nights, in contrast to dozens on previous nights as police clashed with demonstrators in unrest that has focused international attention on often-troubled US race relations.
Authorities remain braced for a possible flare-up of civil disturbances ahead of Brown's funeral on Monday. Supporters of both the Brown family and the officer planned events for Saturday.
The St. Louis County NAACP chapter plans to march in the afternoon and supporters of the officer plan a fundraiser on Saturday and Sunday at a bar in a nearby community.
Little information has been released about the investigation of the shooting. A grand jury of three blacks and nine whites began hearing evidence on Wednesday in a process the county prosecutor has said could run until mid-October.
On Friday, hundreds of demonstrators marched, chanting "hands up, don't shoot" near where Brown was shot. Groups of protesters numbering about 20 to 30 each marched up and down the streets.
About 100 protesters, marshaled by volunteers from the clergy, made their way to a parking lot across from the town's police station, where they prayed and chanted while about 20 officers stood in a line outside.
"Tonight's lack of conflict is further proof that good things are happening in Ferguson," Missouri Highway Patrol Captain Ron Johnson told reporters early on Saturday.
The National Guard on Friday began a gradual withdrawal from Ferguson. Johnson said about 20 percent of the force had withdrawn so far.
"Good things happen when people calmly interact, and that is what is happening," Johnson said. St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar told Reuters on Friday night that law enforcement plans for the weekend would consist of "trying to prevent what is a criminal element from coming in on top of us."
Police came under sharp criticism, especially in the first days of demonstrations, for arresting dozens of protesters and using heavy-handed tactics and military gear widely seen as provoking more anger and violence by protesters.
In addition to local activists and clergy, a contingent of US civil rights workers and community activists from Georgia, Florida, Detroit and elsewhere have set up shop in Ferguson and say they plan to remain in town for an extended period.
Part of their agenda is working on ways to improve Ferguson, a community of 21,000 that is about 70 percent African American but where almost all the police and local politicians are white.
They are conducting training and strategy sessions for people who want to continue to protest Brown's death. Civil rights activists say Brown's death followed years of police targeting blacks in the community.
The suspension of two area police officers in recent days highlighted the divide. On Friday, an officer from the St. Louis County Police Department was removed from active duty and placed in an administrative position pending an internal investigation after a video surfaced in which he boasted of being "a killer."
Officer Dan Page, a 35-year police force veteran who had also served in the US military, was seen in the video addressing a St. Louis chapter of the Oath Keepers, a conservative group of former servicemen.
"I'm also a killer," Page said in the video. "I've killed a lot, and if I need to I'll kill a whole bunch more.
If you don't want to get killed, don't show up in front of me." Page also made disparaging remarks about Muslims and expressed the view that the United States was on the verge of collapse.
Belmar, the county police chief, apologized, saying the comments were "bizarre" and unacceptable. Two days earlier, another St.
Louis-area policeman, an officer from the town of St. Ann, was suspended indefinitely for pointing a semi-automatic assault rifle at a peaceful demonstrator and yelling obscenities.
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