The Park City Police Department arrested an Occupy Wall Street demonstrator a man dressed as pop star Lady Gaga — on Main Street on the first Sunday of the Sundance Film Festival, the first arrest of an Occupy figure in Park City since the movement started.
Occupy Wall Street that day staged a demonstration on Main Street as a precursor to a larger one that was held on Monday at the Wells Fargo branch on Kearns Boulevard.
Phil Kirk, a police captain, said officers were summoned to the 600 block of Main Street at 2:45 p.m. to intervene in a confrontation between the demonstrator and people in a passing Ford Explorer.
An officer arrived and found the man in the Lady Gaga outfit alongside other Occupy protesters dressed in various costumes. Kirk said the officer recognized the man in the Lady Gaga outfit as someone he had warned nearby not to block traffic 15 minutes earlier.
Kirk said the officer interviewed the demonstrator and the people in the vehicle, who are from Pleasant Grove. The demonstrator told the police the driver intentionally hit him while he was engaging people in the vehicle during the protest. The police said a woman in the vehicle told the demonstrator to get a job as the protesters were yelling at the people driving by.
The driver, who was heading northbound, started to pull over and watched as a demonstrator struck the vehicle with a sign, Kirk said. Two police officers responded. They determined that the demonstrator struck the vehicle with the sign, causing damage, Kirk said. A small dent in the right rear fender was discovered, he said, adding that the paint mark found on the vehicle matched paint that was on the demonstrator’s sign.
Kirk said the police arrested an 18-year-old Salt Lake City man named Daniel Hanna. He was charged with disorderly conduct, which is a class C misdemeanor, and a class B misdemeanor count of criminal mischief. A class B misdemeanor, the more serious charge, is punishable by six months in jail and a $1,000 fine upon conviction.
He was booked into the Summit County Jail and released that day after someone posted $683 bail, according to jail records.
There has been a series of Occupy Wall Street demonstrations in Park City stretching since the early fall. They have been peaceful and have drawn smallish crowds compared to Occupy Wall Street events elsewhere.