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CITY OFFICIALS: PORTION OF DIXWELL AVENUE TO BE CLOSED SATURDAY  

COUNTER-PROTEST LEADS TO ARRESTS

New Haven |At 11:30 AM, NHPD Officers were detailed to the New Haven Green to monitor a reported demonstration by a group calling themselves “The Proud Boys”.

The group is NOT affiliated with the Ku Klux Klan or a white-supremacist movement, as was reported by some news outlets and those who represented themselves as members of the “Black Lives Matter” movement and other protest groups.

Rumors that a white-supremacist group were scheduled to rally at the NH Green prompted a rallying of counter-protesters including Black Lives Matter.

More people being placed into custody in New Haven. Police are trying to disperse crowd #NHV pic.twitter.com/laWbvKGVFr

— Esteban L. Hernandez (@EstebanHRZ) July 8, 2017

Four counter-protesters were arrested. At 1:02 PM, Keith Dramese Fair (12-16-1981), of Howard Avenue in New Haven, was issued a summons to court, charged with Disorderly Conduct and Interfering with Police. Dramise Fair was treated at the hospital for a repertory ailment – either from an officer’s OC Spray or a smoke-grenade released by a counter-protester.

As Dramese Fair was being detained, Barbra Fair (1-3-1948), of Burwell Street in New Haven, interfered with officers as she tried freeing Dramise from custody after breaking through a police line. Barbara Fair was arrested and summonsed for Interfering with Police after refusing the lawful order to stand back.

At 1:05 PM, as officers formed a line to separate the two groups, Rosanna Raybuyan (5-21-1980), of Jefferson Avenue, Brooklyn, New York, was seen by officers throwing a paint-filled balloon at a NHPD Sergeant. The balloon did not strike the Sergeant but burst at his feet. During Raybuyan’s arrest, an angry mob formed around the officer handcuffing her. Additional officers responded.

 David Simone

Someone from the counter-protest group began throwing smoke grenades towards the Proud Boys and Officers. David Simone (8-26-1988), of Broadway Avenue, North Borgen, New Jersey, confronted an officer and after being ordered to back up, used an amplified megaphone set to a siren noise to the face of the officer. Simone was relieved of his back-pack incident to his arrest. It contained Illegal fireworks type explosives. Simone was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, interfering with Police and the illegal possession of exploding fireworks. The explosives were examined by NHPD Bomb Squad Investigators. The materials were confiscated.

During Simone’s arrest, a knife landed on the top of the boot of an NHPD Sergeant. No one saw whose knife it was or who dropped or threw it.

Officers escorted members of The Proud Boys to their vehicles and they left the area. They did not return.

An officer was injured during the incident but that injury was NOT CAUSED by any demonstrator or counter-protester.

Neither group had a permit to use the NH Green for such activity.