Top Cop: Place, Not Race, Riot Key

Turf, not race, was top of mind for the protesters who rioted in Toledo, Ohio, over the weekend, the city's police chief told The Early Show Monday.

The riot broke out Saturday when protesters confronted members of a group calling itself "America's Nazi Party," who had gathered at a city park. Members of the group didn't stick around long.

But rioters threw baseball-sized rocks at police, vandalized vehicles and stores, and set fire to a neighborhood bar, authorities said. More than 100 people were arrested and one officer was seriously injured.

Toledo Police Chief Mike Navarre

"If this rally had taken place at a neutral site or in a downtown courthouse square," Navarre said, "I don't think we would have had the problems that we did. But because the rally occurred in a neighborhood that is really what the neighbor residents and the gang members took great exception to.

He said there hasn't been a problem in the neighborhood since the four-hour disturbance.

"And it was really confined to one small geographical area," he said. "So, I believe it was more about this protest, and not about race. It's a great neighborhood, very diverse, relatively quiet, with few problems. Certainly, it's a black mark for Toledo, based on what happened. … But we will recover from this."

Navarre said that if he ever had it to do over again, he wouldn't allow them in the neighborhood.

"If I needed to go to court to get an injunction, I would force them to do this on a neutral site," he said.

Navarre said things got out of hand even though is department had about 10 days to prepare for the rally.

"We spent the entire 10 days doing a very thorough preparation involving many agencies, including the FBI," he said. "We had an opportunity to consult with other city police chiefs where these rallies have been held in the last few years. We pretty much got what we expected on Saturday."

He said an officer who was hurt during the riot "has a pretty severe headache … but was in good spirits. We had a number of other officers with minor injuries."

The display in Toledo was more bad behavior than racism, according to Roy Innis, national chairman of the Congress of Racial Equality. Innis told CBS News Correspondent Melissa McDermott, "Really, it is not racism. It is the desire to take part in abhorrent behavior – vandalism, looting, burning, harassing, and victimizing people in their own community.

"The real victims are not the hoodlums," Innis said, "the real victims are the people whose homes were vandalized … residents, senior citizens ordinary people, people with children, policemen who were trying to do their job to protect the citizens… they were the victims."