“This is not dying. We are not going away,” said Danny Manriquez, who stood by a tent he briefly set up on Dewey Square.cq The 25-year-old from Long Beach, Calif., said he has been traveling to cities that had Occupy sites. “Class warfare is what’s going on here,” he said.
The march began at Copley Square at about 7 p.m.cq The crowd’s slow movement through the Back Bay and downtown streets turned into a sprint just before reaching Dewey Square.
There, some protesters shouted “Welcome home, Occupy” and others planted a flag reading “Occupy Boston at Dewey Square” as they filled the section of the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenwaycq from which the protest group was removed from in the early morning of Dec. 10. The 72-day 9/30 to 12/10 encampment was, at the time, the longest continual Occupy demonstration in the country.
Protesters in Oakland clashed with police yesterdaysat.1/28 following a midday rally and march that deteriorated into violence. Protesters threw rocks and bottles at police. Officers responded with volleys of tear gas. Protesters broke into City Hall and smashed glass cases, spray-painted graffiti on walls, and burned an American flag. At least three officers and one protester were injured.cq
The Boston protesters carried signs that expressed support for the Oakland Occupiers: “Occupying is not a crime;” “Occupy Oakland, occupy everything;” “We are Oakland;” and “Stop the brutality.”
The marchers, some of whom wore masks, shouted several anti-police chants laced with profanities, and yelled in unison “banks got bailed out we got tear gassed” as they moved through Boston.
A few protestors, including Bill Lewis, 59, cqsaid they noticed that protesters were targeting police more specifically with their taunts.
“We are so lucky in Boston that we have good relations with he police,” said Lewis, who said he was has been an Occupy Boston member since its first week. “They let us march the hell all over the place and by god we do it.”
“Some people think all police are evil and the minions of the one percent, but they are the 99 percent, too,” he added.
After the demonstration, a protest organizer, Anne Wolfe, 20, a student at Tufts University,cq described the march as a success.
“We’re still here,” she said.
A protest against banks is planned in Boston’s financial district this afternoonmon.1/30, according to a flyer handed out at the rally.
Other protesters said the Occupy movement is planning to reoccupy Dewey Square on April 1st.
