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Huge Brawl Breaks Out Over SC Confederate Flag
COLUMBIA, S.C. – One dude has been arrested after a fight over the Confederate flag in front of the South Carolina Statehouse.
The brawl began about 7:15 p.m. Monday when about a dozen motor vehicles with Confederate flag proponents pulled up in front of the Statehouse and stopped in the middle of the street, Public Safety Department spokeswoman Sherri Iacobelli mentioned in a statement.
About 10 of the flag supporters clashed with about 30 people who were on the Statehouse grounds protesting the flag, the statement explained.
“The blood on my face, the blood in my teeth, the blood on my hands is no comparison to the Southern blood that runs through my veins,” Joe Linder informed CBS News.
Linder, who was struck during the fight, supports the Confederate flag and states “racism has no part” in it.
“I’m gonna tell you one thing, I ain’t sitting down; this’ll just make me walk taller,” he explained to CBS News.
About 50 officers reacted and secured the conflict, which included officers from the Bureau of Protective Services assigned to the Statehouse, as well as Columbia police, University of South Carolina officers and the South Carolina Highway Patrol.
2 blocks of the street in front of the Statehouse was closed for a brief time during the disruption.
Sydney Baldwin informed CBS News the fight commenced when someone had taken his flag.
“I jumped out of my truck,” Baldwin stated. “That was all I did, was grab my flag and I got hit in the side.”
Nicholas Thompson, 25, of Irmo, South Carolina, has been accused with disorderly conduct. It was not clear if he has an attorney.
The Confederate flag has been a target of protests since the fatal shooting of 9 people at a historic black church in Charleston on June 17.
Public Safety Director Leroy Smith informed reporters it was sad that Columbia had a fight when there have been no problems reported in Charleston, where the shooting happened.
The defendant in the Charleston shooting, Dylann Storm Roof, shows up in a number of pictures online with the Confederate flag, prompting calls for removal of the flag from in front of the Statehouse.
South Carolina lawmakers are anticipated next week to take into account recommendations to take the flag down and move it to a museum.
The flag has flown at the Statehouse since the 1960s. It was extracted from the Statehouse dome and positioned at a Confederate Soldier Monument in front of the Statehouse in 2000.
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Source: http://fusionlacedillusions.com/2015/07/01/huge-brawl-breaks-out-over-sc-confederate-flag/
FLAGS DON’T KILL people, PEOPLE kill people