Colorado Springs Iraq War Protest Leads To Arrests

**Update--
Colorado Springs police to launch internal investigation into the arrests Saturday of 7 protestors at the St. Patrick's Day parade:

While the images are disturbing, Cintron said two citizens have called police headquarters expressing support for the police actions. "They said the officers showed great restraint in handling the protesters," Cintron said.

However, members of tembers of the Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission maintain that they were not at the parade to protest, but to peaceably march wearing their green T-shirts, carrying a banner reading "Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission" and holding signs with messages like "Kids Not Bombs." Eric Verlo, the chairman of the PPJPC, had obtained a $15 permit for the group to march.

Shortly after the event began, a parade organizer allegedly called in police to remove the group. At that point, many of them sat down in the street, were subsequently arrested for refusing to disperse, and have alleged brutality at the hands of the police.

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Lawsuits to follow?

Colorado Springs' St. Patrick's Day parade marred by "peace" group arrests--protestors suffer injuries (video):

Colorado Springs police arrested several war protesters Saturday after officers blocked them from marching in the city's St. Patrick's Day parade.

The exact number of arrests was not immediately available.

About 35 members of the Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission had a permit to march under the name of a business owned by commission chairman Eric Verlo. But organizers asked police to block the group when they saw their anti-war signs.

"I didn't shove him, but he turned around and said, you never touch the back of a police officer," peace activist Esther Kisamore said. "He grabbed my wrist and put it down and he had me on the ground."

Activist Mark Lewis, in an email to CBS4, included pictures of what he said was 80-year-old peace activist Elizabeth Fineron being pushed by a parade official and police.

She was dragged, "Which completely removed her pants," Lewis said in his email. "(There are) wounds to her skin as she lay on the side of the parade route. She is still in the hospital having these wounds treated and the damage to her shoulders."

Parade chairman John O'Donnell said organizers don't allow "social issues" in the parade.

Any guesses as to how long before "police brutality" charges crop up?