Photojournalist Josh Pacheco recalled a hectic scene after a swarm of Chicago police officers ordered a crowd of protesters and journalists to disperse from a march in front of the Israeli Consulate on Tuesday.
“Nobody understood the dispersal order, nobody knew exactly where to go,” Pacheco told The Intercept, adding that they had been walking away, trying to leave the area with other journalists. “And that is when I was arrested, I was pulled off of the sidewalk.”
Pacheco — a freelance journalist who has worked with the New York Times, PBS, and Forbes — was one of at least three credentialed journalists arrested amid protests on the second day of the Democratic National Convention.
During their arrest, Pacheco, who was carrying their photography equipment with media credentials hanging around their neck, said they had identified themself as a journalist to officers. But Pacheco said an officer responded by snatching away their credentials.
“I did alert them that I was press,” Pacheco recalled. “It was very visible that I had my press pass.”
Pacheco spent the next nine hours in police custody. Also arrested in the same march were photojournalists Sinna Nasseri and Olga Federova, who shared on social media that they had been released by early Wednesday morning.
Nasseri, whose photography has been featured in the New York Times and the New Yorker, wrote on Instagram that he was arrested while “documenting the protest tonight from a public sidewalk.” He shared video of himself standing in handcuffs next to several officers with his camera still hanging around his neck.
Police charged the three journalists with misdemeanor disorderly conduct, said Steven Baron, the Chicago-based attorney representing the journalists. He declined to share specifics of their cases but alleged the city violated the journalists’ First Amendment rights.
“The journalists were charged … for simply doing their jobs as reporters,” Baron said in an emailed statement. “We are disappointed that the City of Chicago chose to sweep the First Amendment under the rug with its heavy-handed tactics against working journalists.”
Chicago Police Superintendent Larry Snelling acknowledged the three arrests in a daily press conference on Wednesday morning and scolded the actions of journalists at the demonstration.
“If you’re not moving, if you’re not complying with our orders at that time, you may be breaking the law yourselves,” Snelling said, before blaming journalists for being “so close” to protesters, which he said had obstructed officers’ ability to move about.
Snelling refused to recognize Tuesday’s rally as a demonstration and said participants had “the intent on fighting with the police, destroying things, burning flags.” Snelling did not provide evidence to substantiate the alleged intent of those who attended the rally but vaguely referred to verbal threats aimed at officers.
“Last night wasn’t a protest — to call last night a protest would be disrespectful to people who have actually protested for things that have moved societies forward across the county,” said Deputy Mayor of Community Safety Garien Gatewood at the press conference. “What we had is people who came down to the city to cause harm, to wreak havoc.”
The Chicago Police Department did not respond to requests for comment.
Police said they had arrested around 50 people on Tuesday, but the National Lawyers Guild Chicago, a nonprofit legal support organization, reported arrests of at least 70 protesters. The lawyers guild said the tally was incomplete since attorneys were having trouble locating arrested protesters in police custody.
At the march, a small group of protesters had gathered in front of the consulate in downtown Chicago as Democratic officials took the convention’s main stage at the United Center. They carried signs that read “Democrats drop bombs and faux promises” and a large banner with “Shut Down the DNC for Gaza.”
After a series of speeches in which organizers spoke of solidarity with Palestinians, demonstrators marched away from the consulate toward Madison Street, where they were met with several lines of officers who immediately stopped the march and pushed the group backward, according to video and live broadcasts from the rally posted on social media.
The lawyers guild said in a statement that police “provoked confrontations, rushed the crowd, indiscriminately arrested people on the sidewalk, and entrapped groups in order to carry out mass arrests.”
Pacheco was released from police custody around 6 a.m. on Wednesday morning. By the evening, they had returned to work, covering a much larger pro-Palestine demonstration in Union Park, which included speakers such as former presidential candidate Jill Stein. Pacheco posted footage on social media showing a large law enforcement presence with officers mounted on bikes, wielding batons, surrounding the park.
Within an hour, they shared a separate video, this time showing a group of Chicago police officers on a train platform, detaining two women who were taking part in the march.