A memorial of flowers, soft toys and cards on the road where Michael Brown was shot by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in August was destroyed in the early hours of Friday, prompting an outraged response on social media.



Photographs posted on Twitter at 3am showed the memorial scattered over Canfield Drive, apparently having been run over by a car. Flowers had been squashed and dragged along what looked like skid marks made by tires.

The spoiling of the memorial, whether consciously or by accident, led to an immediate rallying cry, with supporters of Brown, an African American teenager who was unarmed when he was killed, hurrying to the scene to repair the damage.

Within a couple of hours the memorial had been put back together, with fresh flowers and new toys.

Brown’s death and the decision of a grand jury not to indict officer Wilson led to extensive protests and rioting in Ferguson, near St Louis, in August and last month. However, the Ferguson police department appeared unperturbed by the destruction of the memorial, according to media reports.

The Washington Post reported that when asked if there would be an investigation, a police spokesman referred to the memorial as “a pile of trash in the middle of the street”.

The neighbouring St Louis suburb of Berkeley saw two nights of protests this week after another black teenager, Antonio Martin, was shot dead by a police officer. In that case, police said Martin had pointed a loaded gun at the officer seconds before he was killed.

The destroyed and repaired memorial to Brown marks the spot where his body lay for four hours after he was shot by Wilson. A second makeshift memorial, beside a nearby lamppost, was burned down in September.