Community Leaders Ask For Peace Ahead Of Porter Trial Verdict

BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- Tuesday, there was a call for calm from young community leaders and Congressman Elijah Cummings. As many people wait with anticipation for that verdict in Officer William Porter's trial, many people are pushing a message of peace.

Marcus Washington is at Penn North with that people are saying.

Some are saying they have a higher expectation for our city.

It started with the familiar walk along the streets impacted by April's unrest and ended with a prayer for peace following the verdict in the trial of Officer William Porter.

A group of young leaders in Baltimore are pleading with younger kids and teens to keep peace once a verdict is reached.

"It's okay when the mayor does it; it's okay when the police commissioner does it but when you have young people who are standing up against violence and saying it will not happen in our community, it then touches that generation that's actually out here," said DeShawn Batson, one of the peace rally's organizers.

This call is a push to prevent unrest from happening again.

"If you have the ability to evoke change, if you have the ability to speak up and you don't, I think you yourself are an obstruction to justice," said minister Mark Montgomery.

"The future of our community will not be defined at the moment of the verdict but it will be defined in the days and years that follow," said Congressman Elijah Cummings.

Cummings is calling for calm, saying he is begging for people to respect the community they call home.

"Our city is not a perfect city but we must do everything in our power, whether we agree with the verdict or not, to create an atmosphere where we can move more and more towards a more perfect city," he said.

Congressman Cummings asks people to remember that when the CVS burned down, people in the neighborhood couldn't get medicine.