June 1, 2020

The city of Sioux Falls is vowing to find and hold accountable those who assaulted police officers, vandalized and burglarized May 31.

“It’s important to know we have a lot of video collected. We have a lot of photos collected, and we will be using this to prosecute,” Mayor Paul TenHaken said.

“There’s consequences for actions.”

Click here to see video being used to identify suspects.

Some arrests already have been made. One of two known arrests was a person from Omaha, but no other information has come out yet.

Much of the violence occurred around The Empire Mall, where some rioters walked following a peaceful protest downtown in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd as he was being arrested by police in Minneapolis.

The damage largely consisted of broken windows. Those vandalized include the JCPenney wing of The Empire Mall, including women’s clothing store Evereve.

T.J. Maxx, also on the mall campus, had significant window damage.

A retail center across Louise Avenue that includes Riddle’s Jewelry, Chico’s, Starbucks and Halberstadt’s Men’s Clothiers also had a lot of broken glass and some stolen merchandise.

To the east, Wireless World at 41st Street and Kiwanis Avenue was damaged with merchandise stolen.

Walgreens, Rudolph’s Shoe Mart and Liberty National Bank also had damage in the area of 41st Street and Louise Avenue.

TenHaken held up a rock from the scene that was thrown at officers that he estimated at 5 to 7 pounds.

“And we have all kinds of footage of rocks like this being thrown at the law enforcement officers of this city,” he said.

One officer’s hand was hurt, but there were no serious injuries.

“I want to thank those at the mall who also tried to diffuse the situation,” TenHaken said, adding some in the crowd linked arms to form a human chain in front of law enforcement.

More concerning, though, was the high number of teens at the mall who became part of the problem.

“These were mostly kids and mostly that were raised here,” he said. “I recognized kids on this video. I saw them wearing shirts of local sports leagues and local high schools. Our city has failed these kids, and these parents have failed their children.”

A middle school teacher notified the city that she recognized students in surveillance video, he added.

“Last night highlighted an area where our community needs to come together to address – the youth in this city,” he said.
“We cannot afford to have a lost generation.”

There had been rumors of out-of-town attendees coming in for the event, but while police looked for buses, they didn’t find any, Police Chief Matt Burns said.

“In any event like this with this much exposure, there’s lots of information floating around out there on social media,” he said.

“We’ll be prepared if that should occur in the future.”

One of the officers’ primary goals was not to allow the protesters to break into the mall and loot inside, he said.

“We said from the very beginning that was a bright red line. We were not going to let that happen,” Burns said. “We bent, but we did not break. We took some shots … but we did not yield, and we held the line.”

There was a break-in later in the night at Fleet Farm, and firearms were stolen, he said. Police are working to determine how much was taken.

Citizens with video or other documentation from last night are asked to submit it here through Crime Stoppers.

“We can’t ignore it. We won’t ignore it. … If you think you can riot, loot, steal, burglarize, create property damage and hurt others in this city with impunity you’re mistaken,” Burns said. “We will hold you to account through various resources, and we’ll do our job.”

TenHaken encouraged those who know they committed crimes to turn themselves in to police.

City officials stressed the majority of the day’s events were positive, praising the several thousand who were estimated to attend the organized event downtown.

“We have work ahead of us here to do, to be more inclusive as a city,” TenHaken said. “I look forward to continuing the conversation for an even better and more unified One Sioux Falls, but the violence and destruction we saw last night does nothing to pay honor to those who have lost their lives or who do feel marginalized.

“We took one step forward at 5 p.m. and two steps back at 9 p.m.”