W. Indian Day Parade rolls into Brooklyn

Spectators danced and sang behind police barricades as music pounded from massive loudspeakers aboard floats in the West Indian Day Parade that rumbled through Brooklyn Monday.

There was violence amid the festivities, and at least one shooting nearby Monday night killed a person and injured a police officer, authorities said.

The annual Labor Day parade celebrating the culture of the Caribbean islands is one of the city's largest and most colorful, featuring dancers in enormous feathered costumes.

Spectators waved the flags of their native islands and enjoyed a lineup of Caribbean delicacies sold by vendors whose barbecues released delicious-smelling smoke into the late-summer air.

"This parade is fabulous!" said Arnold Caballero, 52, who was manning a huge barbecue. "There are people of all countries, and you meet friends you haven't seen for years."

The Trinidad native estimated that by day's end he would sell about 500 pounds of jerk and curry chicken, beef and pork from the stand he's run for a decade with two friends.

Monday night, just blocks from the parade route and hours later, several people were shot, one fatally. A police officer was shot in the arm, a police spokesman told Newsday.

Earlier, police helicopters hovered over the parade as motorcycle officers patrolled the ground. A shooting about 3 p.m. on Eastern Parkway near Washington Avenue along the parade route injured two men, who were hospitalized with nonlife-threatening injuries. The shooter was being sought.

And a City Council member from Brooklyn was detained during the parade after a confrontation with police. A spokesman for council member Jumaane Williams said Williams was stopped walking on a blocked-off sidewalk with permission of a police official. He was held about 30 minutes and no charges were filed.

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio says one of his employees was detained with Williams, and called for an investigation.

Earlier, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo visited a pre-parade breakfast before heading upstate to speak with Tropical Storm Irene victims.

With Deborah S. Morris