Baltimore Police say they've gotten no formal complaints about the handling of the mass arrests about the handling of the mass arrests Saturday at a protest that blocked Interstate 83, but acknowledge it took some time for all the arrestees to be processed.

"The Baltimore Police Department is acutely aware of the level of scrutiny that has been placed on us and specifically the transport wagons themselves," police said in a statement on Twitter. "In this scenario of a mass arrest, we made adjustments to ensure each arrestee was adequately attended to."

 

 

The protest of police brutality, called Afromation, turned into a march down the Charles Street on-ramp, which was already closed to traffic for Artscape. The protesters locked arms and blocked northbound traffic on the Jones Falls Expressway. Police say many of the 65 arrested were taken to the Northern District station instead of Central Booking. Then, at Commissioner Kevin Davis' direction, those with proper identification were given a criminal and traffic citation for standing on the highway and refusing to heed police warnings.

However, while police acknowledge informal complaints from those arrested about the amount of time it took to get through them all, they say they did take steps for arrestee comfort, including offering opportunities to stretch and use the bathroom, and granting requests by those who wanted to be cuffed with their hands in front instead of behind them.