Police used tear gas and smoke bombs to repel crowds who threw Molotov cocktails during another violent night on the streets of a St Louis suburb in the wake of the shooting of the unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown.

Rioters looted and burned shops, vandalised vehicles and taunted riot police who tried to block access to parts of a predominantly black suburb of St Louis after a candlelight vigil for an unarmed man who was fatally shot by an officer turned ugly.

There was vandalism after thousands of people attended a vigil for an unarmed black US teenager who was shot and killed by a police officer.

FOR the first time since the Washington-area sniper slayings began, more than one witness saw a man fire and flee in a white van, but police said yesterday that none of the witnesses got a good enough look to yield a sketch.