Protesters take to the streets of Louisville on Kentucky Derby Day

Multiple groups held protests, marches and rallies in Louisville Saturday around the 146th running of the Kentucky Derby, including groups calling for justice in the shooting death of Breonna Taylor.

Groups including the Justice and Freedom Coalition and Until Freedom, which had called for boycotts of the Derby, gathered at South Central Park, less than a mile from Churchill Downs, late Saturday afternoon before marching to the track for demonstrations.

“We cannot simply throw a party in a gentrified neighborhood and move on,” Pastor Tim Findley told the crowd as they prepared to march to the track. “Today is the day we say we will not move on.”

Once they arrived at the track, protesters chanted Taylor’s name and marched around the fence on the perimeter, which was heavily guarded by law enforcement in riot gear and National Guard members inside.

Just before post time, a plane flew over the racetrack pulling a banner that read, “Arrest the cops who killed Breonna Taylor,” the Courier-Journal reported.

Some demonstrators later blocked traffic at Central Avenue and Taylor Boulevard near the track. By 8 p.m., the crowd of protesters had dwindled and returned to the park.

“Do not be distracted” by others who might want to provoke violence, Sadiqa Reynolds told the protesters before they began to march earlier in the evening. “Stay focused. They owe us everything.”

Another speaker said, “we don’t want mint juleps. We want justice.”

Members of the heavily-armed Black militia NFAC gathered at G. G. Moore Park before marching to Churchill Downs, where they lined up outside the front gate.

Saturday was the 101st day of protests in Kentucky’s largest city.

Earlier in the day, a different heavily-armed group of people, some carrying American flags and Donald Trump banners, had gathered at Carrie Gaulbert Cox Park, saying they were there to show support for police. Dylan Stevens, who calls himself “the Angry Viking,” told members of the media that “Louisville citizens asked us to be here.”

That group, which called themselves “American patriots,” moved to downtown to Jefferson Square Park by early afternoon, where there were tense exchanges with protesters demanding justice for Taylor.

The armed group moved on just before officers with the Louisville Metro Police Department arrived carrying sticks.

The police department said in an early afternoon update that because of the large crowd, they “determined it was not safe to go in and we did not want to escalate the situation with police presence.”

“As the tensions subsided and the groups began to move together down Jefferson toward Second Street,” police said they brought officers in “to create a barrier across Jefferson to separate the two groups.”

Police said they deployed most of their resources to the area around Churchill Downs “because of the large-scale protests anticipated” near the track.

Deputy Chief LaVita Chavous of the Louisville police said in a media briefing Saturday night that there had been three arrests earlier in the day but that they were not during the march at Churchill Downs or the clash between groups at Jefferson Square.

One arrest, for criminal mischief, was because of damage to a dump truck. The others were for possession of marijuana and possession of a handgun by a convicted felon, she said.

Mayor Greg Fischer urged people still downtown Saturday night to “keep the focus on where it has been all day, and that is on the need for racial justice.”

This story was originally published September 5, 2020 at 1:54 PM.