Streets where buildings burned and mobs pelted police with rocks were deserted early Friday following a riot that began when a white officer shot a black man to death during a traffic stop.
"The city is very calm right now," Police Chief Darrel Stephens said at a 6 a.m. news conference. "No new incidents have taken place."At least 11 people were injured, including a police officer who was shot and a newspaper photographer who was beaten, as hundreds of people swarmed through the streets after the shooting Thursday.
Stores were looted and thick smoke clouded the predominantly black neighborhood just south of downtown. Groups of youths ran back and forth in the night, throwing rocks, bricks and bottles at officers in riot gear, businesses and passing cars.
"They were tossing everything at us but the kitchen sink," said Sgt. Denny Simmons, who was struck in the arm during the initial standoff between police and a group of about 100 young men.
City leaders met Friday with representatives of the NAACP to explore ways to quell tensions. The Rev. Manuel Sykes, pastor at Bethel Community Baptist Church, offered his church as a meeting place for people to air feelings and talk about what happened.
Bishop John Copeland of Macedonia Free
Will Baptist Church urged parents to keep young people indoors, saying Friday, "It's going to take all of us to solve our problems."
Copeland said the perception in the black community that police won't be punished in such cases is a national problem. "There's something wrong with the system when something like this happens and African-Americans know what the verdict will be before anybody goes on trial," he said.
Twenty people were arrested, Stephens said. Police planned to work 12-hour shifts and step up patrols Friday.
Twenty-eight buildings were set on fire, he said. Firefighters, also pelted with rocks and other debris, pulled back and let some buildings burn. Among the many buildings and vehicles set ablaze were a police substation, a post office, a police cruiser and TV news truck.
But by midnight, police officers were removing barricades from the 25-square-block area and only a few fires still burned.
The trouble started after two officers stopped a car with two young men inside at around 5:30 p.m. Police said the car was speeding, and the officers approached it after the vehicle stopped at a red light.
"The driver continually refused to roll his window down or obey any verbal commands," police said in a news release. The officers could not see the car's occupants because the windows were darkly tinted, police said.
Officer Jim Knight fired several shots through the windshield, striking the driver, after the car lurched forward, apparently trying to run the officer over, police said. But witnesses said Knight was standing with his hands on the hood when the car inched forward and his partner yelled for him to shoot, the St. Petersburg Times reported.
Lisa Craft told the newspaper that Knight fired five times. "The boy wasn't going fast enough to run them over. He wasn't even going 2 mph," she said.
Police identified the man as Tyron Lewis, 18. He died before reaching Bayfront Medical Center, a hospital spokesman said.
It was the sixth police shooting of the year in St. Petersburg, coming just one week after another shooting in the same area.
Shortly after 9 p.m. Thursday, helmeted police carrying shields cordoned off several blocks around the intersection. They fired tear gas into the crowd to disperse mobs looting businesses. One officer was shot in the shoulder and treated at a hospital.
One witness said police made the situation worse by marching through the streets in riot gear.
Stephens defended his department's actions.
"Any time you have an encounter between police and a member of the community, particularly when there's gunfire involved and there's loss of life, there are lots and lots of rumors," he said.
St. Petersburg police are among the most understaffed in the country, according to FBI crime statistics. The department ranked sixth of 124 cities and counties in violent crimes per police officer in 1994. The Tampa Bay-area city has a population of about 240,000, roughly 20 percent black.
More than 350 officers from several counties and the Florida Highway Patrol were called in and Gov. Lawton Chiles offered further state assistance.
The White House also expressed concern.
"We're making inquiries of local officials for an assessment of the situation," White House press secretary Mike McCurry said from New Orleans, where he was on a campaign trip with President Clinton.
A Tampa Tribune photographer said three men attacked him when he stepped out of his car to photograph the violence.
A St. Petersburg woman said she was trying to flee the mobs when a truck pulled beside her car and a passenger pointed a gun at her children, a 9-year-old and an 18-month-old.
"I just told the kids to get down. I said, `Mommy will get you through this,"' Phyllis Williams said, her hands still shaking. "I thought my kids were going to be killed."