Cleveland Chief of Police Calvin Williams stepped in the middle of a heated confrontation between protesters and was shoved before cooling the situation into an eventual prayer circle.
Joseph Offutt from Dallas, Texas, was among a mix of protesters when arguments began to heat up. Amid the raucous din could be heard shouts of "You're not gonna get our guns, you're not gonna get our guns," and "You're too young to know about it."
The chief asked the crowd to back away from the altercation before stepping between Offutt and other protesters. After a bit of discussion, Offutt asked Chief Williams and surrounding people to join him in prayer.
"Sir, do you mind if I say a prayer with you?" asked Offutt. "That's what we do."
Offutt's prayer circle bowed their heads and joined hands as he prayed.
"Dear Lord, I thank you so much for allowing everyone to be here today. I just want to say thank you for keeping everybody safe. it is a true blessing to see how everyone can come together with the law enforcement officers here, interacting with the people, Lord. That is you doing your work. I pray we can send this message across the country, that it doesn't matter what background we come from, we're from all walks of life, but we can come together and unite as one, and make better change for the communities in our country. I pray you keep all our officers safe, keep them to do the job to the best they're trained and that we can do more to interact with our police officers, Lord. I pray this in your name, amen."
After the prayer, the tensions of the group began to dissipate.
"I wasn't really that heated," said Offutt. "I actually came to listen, that's what it's all about. ... What that man just did was probably the most powerful thing someone could've done. He's the chief, and he came in to the middle of all the chaos here. He came in the middle and said, "Hey, what can we do to help? What do you need from me?" and that's what it's all about."
Offutt said he's a member of Kindness365, a national organization that focuses on healing community relations through acts of kindness and conversation.
"We hope everybody across the country can see that. It was successful in Dallas, we did that in Dallas. We're actually traveling to Baton Rouge. ... It starts with the unity first. Once we come together, we're going to start addressing all the issues that we have there."
Offutt said Chief Williams mimicked his words about unity when cooling the situation.
