Dozens Protest Police Brutality Along Highway 50 From Sacramento To El Dorado County
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — Dozens of people took to overpasses from El Dorado County to Sacramento County to protest police brutality Thursday.
The grassroots demonstration falls exactly one month after the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers. Demonstrators could be seen on around 30 overpasses along Highway 50 with signs naming approximately 60 people who have died from police encounters.
Protest organizer Moria Magneson hopes the dozens of signs will make drivers pay attention to what is going on in the country.
"It's a long-distance enlightenment," said Magneson. "It's easy to look away...but when you are driving you can not close your eyes. You have to see and they are registering on some level."
Magneson hopes the grassroots effort titled "Black Lives: An American Overture," will encourage more people to become allies for the black community.
"We have to change all the structures. We have to dissolve them, do what we can, tear them down. As a white person, especially because I am part of it in so many ways I don't even see it, it is my responsibility," she said.
The title of the protest is meant to be poetic in nature, according to protesters.
"Being called the 'overture' as in the beginning. The last 200 years the country did one thing and now we are going to the real act to be a better country," said Amy Enslow.
"It felt powerful. It felt sort of poetic and it is the ability to be seen and keep the conversation going," said protester, Jennifer Frost.
The demonstration stretched from Alhambra Boulevard to El Dorado Trail.
