Charges dismissed for San Francisco activists

Charges against six people arrested for allegedly trying to attack San Francisco supervisor Gavin Newsom during Sunday's gay pride parade have been dismissed, prosecutors said Tuesday. "We are going to dismiss the charges pending further investigation," said Mark MacNamara, spokesman for District Attorney Terence Hallinan, according the the San Francisco Chronicle. The five men and one woman arrested Sunday are members of a group called Gay Shame, who objected to corporate sponsorship of the parade and the inclusion of Newsom. According to police, the group jumped a barricade along the parade route and rushed toward a car carrying Newsom, with three of them waving metal, bamboo, and wooden poles in a threatening manner. Supporters of the six said that nobody had threatened Newsom and that the poles had been attached to banners that the demonstrators were trying to unfurl. The demonstrators were being held without bail on suspicion of threatening a public official and conspiring both to commit a crime and to do so as a criminal gang--all felony charges. The protesters were released Tuesday, and the charges were dropped Wednesday.