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Update: Mckesson is out of jail, and he’s tweeting a lot. You can read his tweets here, but it sounds like he will share his experience with all of us in due time.
“I'll write something soon about the past 17 hours,” he tweeted.
As I was in the cell over the past 17 hours, I thought of the quote that simply says if you want to test a man's character, give him power.
— deray mckesson (@deray) July 10, 2016
Earlier: Well-known #blacklivesmatter activist DeRay Mckesson was arrested during protests in Baton Rouge late last night. Several such protests were taking place across the country after the deaths of two black men last week in violent encounters with the police.
Mckesson has become a high-profile leader in the Black Lives Matter movement, and has used social media — especially Twitter and its Periscope livestreaming video app — to broadcast and organize.
In a video from Louisiana, where Alton Sterling was killed during an arrest, Mckesson is walking on the side of the road and noting the lack of a sidewalk. You can then hear a police officer addressing him (“You with the loud shoes” — red sneakers are a Mckesson signature at protests) and telling him he would go to jail if he walked on the road.
It appears from the video that Mckesson did not cross the line into the road, but he is soon arrested anyway, and his phone is handed to other protestors who continue to stream. “I’m under arrest, y’all,” says Mckesson.
Mckesson has since communicated to fellow protesters that he was unhurt in custody, but Twitter has become aflame with #FreeDeRay posts. It is the No. 1 trend on Twitter.
The use of social video has been a key role in the social media movement over excessive use of police force, with disturbing live imagery being distributed widely. That includes the death of another man, Philando Castile, whose death was streamed on Facebook Live by his fiancee, Diamond Reynolds.
Activist Johnetta Elzie, who works closely with Mckesson on a number of anti-police brutality initiatives, just tweeted this:
We're talking to @deray right now. He said there are about 50 ppl protesters around him, and they are fine. #AltonSterling
— Johnetta Elzie (@Nettaaaaaaaa) July 10, 2016
Until there’s more news, here’s the full interview with Mckesson and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey that took place at the Code conference in June, in which McKesson talks about using social media for his activism:
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
