Two FBI officers were shot and wounded at a house in north St. Louis County early on Wednesday, but the incident was confirmed to not be directly related to the ongoing racially-charged protests in Ferguson, an FBI spokeswoman said.
At 2:53 a.m. Wednesday, the two unidentified agents were assisting the University City Police Department execute an arrest warrant for a suspect who had barricaded himself inside a house when the attack occurred, with one officer being shot in the shoulder and the other in the leg, said Rebecca Wu, a spokeswoman with the FBI St. Louis Division.
"The incident is not directly related to the Ferguson protests," Wu said, adding that the officers' injuries were not life-threatening, according to local broadcaster KSDK's website.
The flashing lights of police cars, fire trucks and ambulances could be seen near the scene of the shooting, which took place about five miles south of Ferguson, Huffington Post reported.
Meanwhile, the FBI shooting incident followed a second night of calmer demonstrations in Ferguson, Mo., with police forces and protestors clashing in several areas.
While 61 people were arrested late Monday during a night for arson, looting, vandalism and sporadic gunfire that police countered with volleys of tear gas and smoke bombs, late Tuesday saw only 44 people getting arrested.
"About 2,000 National Guard troops dispatched to the St. Louis area helped police stave off a second night of rioting and arson after a grand jury declined to indict a white policeman in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black teenager, as sympathy protests spread to several U.S. cities," Reuters reported.
On Tuesday, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the federal investigation into the shooting of Brown will be continued by the Department of Justice and the FBI, Breitbart reported.
The FBI and the Justice Department will pursue two investigations, one into potential civil rights violations by the 28-year-old cop when he fatally shot 18-year-old unarmed Brown on Aug. 9, and one into the practices of the overwhelmingly white Ferguson police force, which operates in a predominantly black community.
