Pastor says his church was set on fire during Monday’s unrest 
 
 FERGUSON, Mo. (KMOV.com) – Pastor Carlton Lee, of The Flood Christian Church, says his church was set on fire overnight. 
 
 Chairs were overturned and soot and water damage was seen throughout the building. The church also sustained damage to its windows. 
 
 “This is way past dangerous I gave this my all empties out my bank account my kids bank account my wife’s bank account dedicated to this church and now to hear that it was in flames I don’t know what to say its mind boggling,” Lee said. 
 
 Lee joined in the protests and says he has received 71 death threats in the days since Michael Brown was shot and killed on Canfield Drive. 
 
 Pastor Lee says he plans to rebuild and will continue protesting. 
 
 Mike Brown Sr. is a member of the church, which is located in the 7400 block of West Florissant. ||||| "Half of this protest I feel like is baiting cops ... sort of about proving who you are against the police," said Wilder Bunke, 21, of Hollywood, who was critical of actions by some in the crowd. "The modern-day "... the police" isn't shooting a cop, it's posting a picture of yourself posing with a cop car on Facebook or Twitter." ||||| FERGUSON, Mo. (AP) — National Guard reinforcements helped contain the latest protests in Ferguson, preventing a second night of the chaos that led to arson and looting after a grand jury decided not to indict the white police officer who killed Michael Brown. 
 
 Police officers confront protesters Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Ferguson, Mo. Missouri's governor ordered hundreds more state militia into Ferguson on Tuesday, after a night of protests and rioting over... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo provided by ABC News, ABC News' chief anchor George Stephanopoulos, left, interviews Ferguson, MO., police officer Darren Wilson, Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014 in Missouri. The interview will air... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this aerial photo, a worker surveys the scene at a charred building Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Ferguson, Mo., after it was burned in overnight protests following a grand jury's decision not to indict... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this aerial photo, the St. Louis skyline is seen in the distance Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, as fires smolder in Ferguson, Mo., after they were set during in overnight protests following a grand jury's... (Associated Press) 
 
 Police shoot pepper spray toward protesters in front of the Ferguson Police Department on Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Ferguson, Mo. Missouri's governor ordered hundreds more state militia into Ferguson... (Associated Press) 
 
 Protesters vandalize a police vehicle outside of the Ferguson city hall on Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Ferguson, Mo. Missouri's governor ordered hundreds more state militia into Ferguson on Tuesday, after... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this aerial photo,people look at a row of charred cars at a used car dealership, Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Dellwood, Mo., after they were burned in overnight protests following a grand jury's decision... (Associated Press) 
 
 A member of the Missouri Highway Patrol walks past a building burned to the ground, Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Dellwood, Mo. The building and several others in-and-around Ferguson were burned during protests... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this aerial photo, workers dig in the parking lot of a building Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Ferguson, Mo., after it was burned in overnight protests following a grand jury's decision not to indict a... (Associated Press) 
 
 Police take people into custody Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Brentwood, Mo. Missouri's governor ordered hundreds more state militia into Ferguson on Tuesday, after a night of protests and rioting over a... (Associated Press) 
 
 Sharon Otis, of Ferguson, Mo., helps clean up the On On Chop Suey restaurant Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Ferguson, Mo., after it was damaged in overnight protests following a grand jury's decision not... (Associated Press) 
 
 Demonstrators returned Tuesday to the riot-scarred streets. But with hundreds of additional troops standing watch over neighborhoods and businesses, the protests had far less destructive power than the previous night. However, officers still used some tear gas and pepper spray, and demonstrators set a squad car on fire and broke windows at City Hall. 
 
 As the tension in Ferguson eased somewhat, officer Darren Wilson broke his long public silence, insisting on national television that he could not have done anything differently in the confrontation with Brown. 
 
 The toll from Monday's protests — 12 commercial buildings burned to the ground, plus eight other blazes and a dozen vehicles torched — prompted Missouri governor Jay Nixon to send a large contingent of extra National Guard troops. 
 
 The governor ordered the initial force of 700 to be increased to 2,200 in hopes that their presence would help local law enforcement keep order in the St. Louis suburb. 
 
 "Lives and property must be protected," Nixon said. "This community deserves to have peace." 
 
 Guard units protected the Ferguson Police Department and left crowd control, arrests and use of tear gas to local officers. In one commercial area Wednesday morning, a soldier was stationed at every few storefronts, and some were on rooftops. 
 
 Forty-four people were arrested, most for failure to disperse. Outside police headquarters, one woman was taken into custody after protesters hurled what appeared to be smoke bombs, flares and frozen water bottles at a line of officers. Several other protesters were arrested after defying police instructions to get out of the street or out of the way of police vehicles. 
 
 Protesters threw rocks, tent poles, and bottles — some containing urine — at officers. As the crowd dispersed early Wednesday, some threw rocks through the windows of a muffler shop and a used-car dealership near a painted mural that read "Peace for Ferguson." 
 
 Some streets that had been overrun the previous night were deserted, except for the occasional police cruiser or National Guard vehicle. Some Guard crews monitored empty parking lots. 
 
 Other large demonstrations were held across the country for a second day. Hundreds of Seattle high school students walked out of classes, and several hundred people marched down a Cleveland freeway ramp to block rush-hour traffic. 
 
 During an interview with ABC News, Wilson said he has a clean conscience because "I know I did my job right." 
 
 Wilson, 28, had been with the Ferguson police force for less than three years before the Aug. 9 shooting. He told ABC that Brown's shooting was the first time he fired his gun on the job. 
 
 Asked whether the encounter would have unfolded the same way if Brown had been white, Wilson said yes. 
 
 Attorneys for the Brown family vowed to push for federal charges against Wilson and said the grand jury process was rigged from the start to clear Wilson. 
 
 "We said from the very beginning that the decision of this grand jury was going to be the direct reflection of the presentation of the evidence by the prosecutor's office," attorney Anthony Gray said. He suggested the office of the county's top prosecutor, Bob McCulloch, presented some testimony to discredit the process, including from witnesses who did not see the shooting. 
 
 Brown's parents made public calls for peace in the run-up to Monday's announcement, and on Tuesday, their representatives again stressed that the people setting fires were not on Michael Brown's side. 
 
 Videos that were widely circulated on Tuesday showed Brown's mother, Lesley McSpadden, standing atop a car and breaking down as the announcement of the grand jury decision blares over the stereo. 
 
 Her husband, Brown's stepfather, comforts her, then begins angrily yelling "Burn the bitch down!" to a crowd gathered around him. Asked about the comment at a news conference, family attorney Benjamin Crump said the reaction was, "raw emotion. Not appropriate at all. Completely inappropriate." 
 
 The Brown family attorneys said they hope an ongoing federal civil rights investigation leads to charges. But federal investigations of police misconduct face a steep legal standard, requiring proof that an officer willfully violated a victim's civil rights. 
 
 Testimony from Wilson that he felt threatened, and physical evidence almost certainly complicates any efforts to seek federal charges. 
 
 Under federal law, "you have to prove as a prosecutor that the officer knew at the moment that he pulled the trigger that he was using too much force, that he was violating the Constitution," said Seth Rosenthal, a former Justice Department civil rights prosecutor. 
 
 The Justice Department has also launched a broad probe into the Ferguson Police Department, looking for patterns of discrimination. 
 
 Attorney General Eric Holder said the department aims to complete those investigations as quickly as possible "to restore trust, to rebuild understanding and to foster cooperation between law enforcement and community members." 
 
 Regardless of the outcome of the federal investigations, Brown's family also could file a wrongful-death lawsuit against Wilson. 
 
 Speaking in Chicago, President Barack Obama said "the frustrations that we've seen are not just about a particular incident. They have deep roots in many communities of color who have a sense that our laws are not always being enforced uniformly or fairly." 
 
 Wilson's lawyers issued a statement praising the decision and saying the officer is grateful to his supporters. 
 
 "Law enforcement personnel must frequently make split-second and difficult decisions," the lawyers wrote. Wilson "followed his training and followed the law." 
 
 Scott Holtgrieve, a St. Louis County man who attended an August fundraiser on Wilson's behalf, always viewed with skepticism witness accounts that Wilson shot Brown while Brown held his hands up in a form of surrender and was on his knees. 
 
 "What they were saying just didn't seem rational — that an officer would shoot someone in cold blood that way at point-blank range, especially in that neighborhood where you know a lot of people are watching," Holtgrieve said. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Link to grand jury documents: http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/_documents/ferguson-shooting/ . 
 
 ___ 
 
 Associated Press writers Andale Gross, Alan Zagier and Phillip Lucas also contributed to this report. ||||| There was mayhem on the streets of Manhattan for a second night Tuesday as demonstrators tied up traffic and taunted police to protest the Missouri decision to let Michael Brown’s killer cop walk. 
 
 An angry swarm marched around the city for hours, amid a cacophony of frustrated drivers’ car horns, before halting at the NYPD kiosk at 43rd St. in Times Square just after midnight. 
 
 “Hands up, don’t shoot!” the group chanted, as they plopped themselves into the busy street for a sit-in that quickly became a traffic jam — one of several that ground parts of the city to a halt. 
 
 “This is madness. An injustice was done down in Ferguson. I see that. What I don't see is how causing a traffic jam in New York City helps resolve anything,” said Rita Dominguez, 42, from Washington Heights, who sat in gridlock for 45 minutes. 
 
 Other commuters took the inconvenience in stride. 
 
 Protesters take over the FDR on Tuesday. (Stephanie Keith for New York Daily News) Demonstrators block traffic along the Manhattan Bridge during a protest on Tuesday. (KENA BETANCUR/AFP/Getty Images) Protesters take over the FDR in New York on Tuesday. (Stephanie Keith for New York Daily News) Protesters on the FDR display their anger over the Michael Brown shooting. (Stephanie Keith for New York Daily News) Demonstrators block the traffic along the Manhattan Bridge on Tuesday. (KENA BETANCUR/AFP/Getty Images) 
 
 “If it was my son, I’d be out there, too. I think they’re doing right by New York City,” said Janet Rosenberg, 51, of the Upper West Side. 
 
 The demonstrations had started earlier that evening, with hundreds gathering in Union Square, then heading up Broadway. 
 
 “Send the racist cop to jail!” they chanted, 
 
 as police officers gave chase and the number of demonstrators swelled to around 600 and stretched for six blocks. 
 
 City Councilman Jumaane Williams was one of a dozen Council members who walked out of a meeting Tuesday to protest the Ferguson, Mo. grand jury decision. (Jesse Ward for New York Daily News) 
 
 “Young men are being killed,” said 29-year-old Gary Schaffer of Brooklyn. “We’ve got to demand an end to this . . . We need to keep people angry.” 
 
 “A black kid was killed and nobody paid for it,” said Brittaney Edmonds, 26, of Brooklyn. 
 
 Cops made no attempt to arrest any of the ringleaders or try to stop them when 
 
 they clogged Lincoln Tunnel traffic by sitting down at 40th St. and Eleventh Ave. for 15 minutes. 
 
 NYPD officers detain a demonstrator during Tuesday's protest near the Lincoln Tunnel in New York. Protesters were blocking traffic. (BRENDAN MCDERMID/REUTERS) A demonstrator burns an American flag during a protest on Tuesday in New York City. (KENA BETANCUR/AFP/Getty Images) Nathan Leigh, 31, of Crown Heights, left, Dominic Ryan, 30, of California, holding a sign reading 'BLACK LIVES MATTER' and other protestors weave their way through Brooklyn and into Bedford–Stuyvesant on Tuesday. (Robert Sabo/New York Daily News) An NYPD officer (R) uses pepper spray as police clash with people protesting against the verdict announced in the shooting death of Michael Brown in Times Square on Tuesday. (MIKE SEGAR/REUTERS) Nunet Clitandre of Queens reacts to recounting of being violently detained by a police officer when she matched the description of a criminal suspect during a protest in Union Square on Tuesday. (Barry Williams for New York Daily News) 
 
 Some of the marchers hurled abuse while others carried signs that read “Jail killer cops.” 
 
 There were at least two arrests in Times Square just before 8 p.m. when an officer warned the crowd to stop blocking cars and move on. 
 
 As the night progressed, a splinter group moved east and jumped onto the FDR, stopping traffic for several minutes. Then the wave moved to the Williamsburg Bridge. A blue barricade of cops stopped its progress there — but the melee also halted bridge traffic for a short time. 
 
 Moments later, another human surge nearly shut down the Manhattan Bridge and the protests spread to Brooklyn. 
 
 A small peaceful protest took place across the street from Brooklyn Federal Court as people gathered to rally against the Ferguson, Mo., grand jury's decision. (Jesse Ward for New York Daily News) Northeast Regional Director of the National Action Network Kirsten John Foy is seen leading Tuesday's protest near the Brooklyn Federal Court. (Jesse Ward for New York Daily News) 
 
 The Queens-bound lane of the Midtown Tunnel had to be closed for 15 minutes around 10:30 p.m. when a protest offshoot tried to walk through it. 
 
 Meanwhile, the largest group continued to march its way around Manhattan, bouncing between the FDR, Times Square and Union Square before drifting north toward Harlem. 
 
 More than a dozen members of the City Council also registered their disgust with what happened in Ferguson, Mo., by walking out of a council meeting earlier Tuesday. 
 
 Amid chants of “Black lives matter!” they marched to the City Hall rotunda, where they took turns denouncing the grand jury decision — and also condemned the recent killings of African-American men by NYPD officers. 
 
 “We stand here today as members of the New York City Council, representatives of our majority minority city to proclaim in solidarity that black lives matter,” they said in unison. 
 
 “Black lives matter in Ferguson, Mo.; black lives matter in the stairwells of our NYCHA communities.” 
 
 That was a reference to the recent fatal shooting of 28-year-old Akai Gurley by a rookie cop. 
 
 “Black lives matter on the streets of Staten Island,” they said, referring to NYPD chokehold victim Eric Garner. 
 
 With John Marzulli
– More than a dozen buildings were set ablaze in Ferguson on Monday. Among those that burned: Flood Christian Church. NBC News reports that's the church where Michael Brown's father was baptized on Sunday. The buildings around it were untouched, leading the Rev. Carlton Lee to speculate that it wasn't rioters who torched his church but white supremacists looking to target him for his support of the Brown family (he's been by their side during press conferences and says he's received 71 death threats) and his vocal calls that Officer Darren Wilson be arrested. KMOV reports the church's windows were broken and chairs were overturned. "We rebuild," says Lee. "We do not stop." More: Protesters outraged by the grand jury decision in the Michael Brown case took to the streets of cities across America for a second night last night after a day that saw dozens of rallies. One of the largest protests was in New York City, where thousands of people chanting slogans including "Black lives matter!" brought traffic in Manhattan and other parts of the city to a halt, reports the New York Daily News. There were also large protests in cities including Oakland, Calif., Portland, Ore., and Los Angeles, where protesters stopped traffic on the US 110 Freeway and police made dozens of arrests, mostly for disorderly conduct, reports the LA Times. In Ferguson itself, where police were supported by thousands of National Guard troops, the night was a lot calmer than Monday night, reports the AP, although police still used tear gas to disperse protesters, a squad car was torched, and at least 44 people were arrested, mostly for failure to disperse.