On one of the busiest days of the holiday season, eight members of the Bay Area Black Lives Matter movement walked onto a southbound Highway 101 offramp for San Francisco International Airport.
They held a Christmas tree painted in red, black and green, and a banner that demanded "Justice for Mario Woods," a 26-year-old Bayview man killed by several police officers earlier this month.
The protesters, who call themselves "BlackXmas," acted in conjunction with six other Black Lives Matter chapters across the nation, including a large action at the Mall of America in Minneapolis. They stood on the SFO offramp for about 15 minutes before the California Highway Patrol arrested them shortly after noon Wednesday.
"San Francisco is a very-revenue driven city. The issues among the black community are often overshadowed or thrown under the rug," says Ronnishia Johnson, a member of Black Lives Matter. She says BLM members chose to focus on stations of commerce -- like Highway 101 and SFO -- to highlight this point.