St. Louis

Chief Sam Dotson said at a press conference late Wednesday night that a group of protesters who had blocked an intersection threw glass bottles and bricks at officers and refused orders to clear the roadway. 

Inert gas was used and when that had no effect on the crowd, police turned to tear gas to clear the intersection, Dotson said. Those arrested face charges of impeding the flow of traffic and resisting arrest, he said. A vacant building and at least one car were burned.

The announcement came nearly a year since Michael Brown's death roiled racial tensions.

Andre Anderson, a 50-year-old with a quarter century in law enforcement, starts in Ferguson on Thursday, essentially on six-month loan from the Phoenix suburb of Glendale, Arizona. Anderson had an inside track for his new, albeit interim gig — Ed Beasley, a black man recently hired as Ferguson's interim city manager — had been Glendale's city manager.