Francois Lenoir / Reuters

In this Oct. 2012 file photo, U.S. General John Allen attends a news conference during a NATO defense ministers meeting at the Alliance headquarters in Brussels. Allen has decided to retire rather than proceed with his nomination as the NATO supreme allied commander due to "health issues" in his family.

General John Allen said Tuesday he has decided to retire for "personal" reasons, leaving behind his nomination as the NATO supreme allied commander.

President Barack Obama accepted Allen's request, praising him as "one of America's finest military leaders" and "a true patriot," The White House released in a statement Tuesday. Back in October, Obama nominated Allen for supreme allied commander of NATO forces in Europe.

Last week, three U.S. military officials told NBC News that Allen's withdrawal from the position was likely to happen. The officials acknowledged that Allen did not want to drag his family through a nomination process, which likely would have brought up his controversial emails with Florida socialite Jill Kelley.

Allen's emails Kelley came to light during the investigation that ultimately brought down CIA director David Petraeus, who confessed to an extramarital affair with a separate woman. The Pentagon had cleared Allen of wrongdoing in that scandal last month.

In a statement Tuesday, Allen made clear that his decision to retire after 32 years in uniform was personal: "While I won't go into the details, my primary concern is for the health of my wife, who has sacrificed so much for so long."

Obama commended Allen's service in Afghanistan, where Allen has served as a top U.S. commander.

"General Allen presided over the significant growth in the size and capability of Afghan National Security Forces, the further degradation of al-Qaida and their extremist allies, and the ongoing transition to Afghan security responsibility across the country," Obama said.

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta also expressed his gratitude for Allen's efforts in Afghanistan.

"His leadership over the last 19 months will long be remembered as pivotal to this campaign," Panetta said in a statement Tuesday. "The strategy he developed and implemented has put us on the right path towards completing this mission, with Afghan forces now on track to step into the lead for security nationwide this spring and to assume full security responsibility by the end of next year."

A group of masked radicals is accused of brutally attacking alleged white supremacists eating lunch at a restaurant in a suburb of Chicago, and the town’s mayor is calling the melee a bizarre and bloody spillover of the NATO Summit.

Tinley Park Mayor Edward J. Zabrocki said as many as 18 people wearing masks and black hoods stormed into the Ashford House in Tinley Park on Saturday, pummeling a group of alleged white supremacists who had gathered at the Irish-American eatery known for its corned beef and bacon.

Zabrocki said he believed the group of assailants had come into town from Indiana to participate in the protests at the NATO Summit, but instead headed to his town to pick a fight. Tinley Park is about 30 miles southwest of Chicago.  

“This was a real riot,” Zabrocki told msnbc.com on Monday. “These guys started beating the crap out of the other group. A lot of tables were knocked over, dishes were broken and there was food all over the walls. It was terrible. It was a mess.”

Zabrocki said five members of the group were arrested; 13 others were still being sought.

According to the Chicago Tribune, Tinley Park Police Chief Steve Neubauer said five men were charged with aggravated battery, mob action and criminal damage to property. The group included three brothers, Jason W. Sutherlin, 33, of Gosport, Ind.; Cody Lee Edward Sutherlin, 23, of Bloomington, Ind.; and Dylan James Sutherlin, 20, also of of Bloomington. Alex R. Stuck, 22, of Bloomington, and James S. Tucker, 26, of Spencer, Ind., were also charged, the Tribune reported.

Nine people were injured and three people were hospitalized, Zabrocki said. He said victims' conditions had improved since the attacks.

The mayor said he believed the victims had ties to white supremacist groups, but he could not confirm their affiliation.

Zabrocki said the Anti-Racist Action, an organization that says it protests "fascist and neo-Nazi activities," claimed responsibility and posted its reasoning on its website. 

According to the Anti-Racist Action website:

“On Saturday, May 19th a group of 30 anti-fascists descended upon Ashford House restaurant in the Chicago suburb of Tinley Park where the 5th annual White Nationalist Economic Summit and Illinois White Nationalist Meet-and-Greet was taking place. The White Nationalists were targeted inside the restaurant and physically attacked, causing several injuries and completely shutting down their meeting.”

Zabrocki said city and police officials had been on alert on Saturday and Sunday because of demonstrations at the NATO Summit in Chicago. He said quick action by police helped law enforcement collar at least five of the suspects.

“We believe that the same group of attackers had been in town for the summit and if they had not been in town, they wouldn't have found this group,” he said.

'Walloped'
Michael Winston, owner of the Ashford House, said the group that was attacked had made a reservation for up to 20, saying they were from an Irish heritage association.

"We had no idea who these people were," Winston said. "We don’t ask for people’s political stuff when they come in the door. Did they look like white supremacists? One or two did, but just because they have a shaved head doesn’t mean they’re a skinhead, right? I know a lot of good-looking guys who have their heads shaved and they aren’t skinheads or white supremacists. And the group that stormed in, it was too fast and too late. It took us by surprise.

“The other group marched into the restaurant, all were in hooded sweatshirts,” Winston told msnbc.com. “Each had a chair leg, baton or a bat. They came in and went straight to a table of white guys and whoever stood up or got in the way, they got walloped.”

He said business inside Ashford House has taken a blow from the weekend violence.

"It was a ghost town in here on Sunday,” Winston said. He said customers have been afraid to come in and others have canceled their reservations. He said a few loyal patrons have stopped by to see if everything was OK.

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Michael Towson

Photo of bomb plot suspect Brent Betterly, 24, taken by a fellow Occupy protester in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Friends of three activists charged with plotting to hurl firebombs during the NATO Summit in Chicago reacted for the most part with disbelief Sunday, saying that the arrests appear to be an effort to undermine peaceful protest.

Brent Betterly, 24, Brian Jacob Church, 20, and Jared Chase, 24, were charged Saturday with a terrorist conspiracy to firebomb four Chicago police stations, the home of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and President Barack Obama’s local campaign headquarters.

Stephanie Auguiste, a 25-year-old from Hollywood, Fla., met all three of the alleged bombers through Occupy Fort Lauderdale, a Florida offshoot of the Occupy Wall Street movement. She said the police description of the trio as violent anarchists didn’t match the young men she knew.

Courtesy Stephanie Auguiste

Stephanie Auguiste, 25, met all three of the alleged firebomb plotters through Occupy protests in Florida.

She said that when she spoke with Betterly by phone last week about his time in Chicago, “He was telling me how local police officers were harassing them a lot and how they were pretty violent toward protesters. “ Betterly was “shocked” by the aggressive tactics but didn’t give Auguiste any indication that he was planning to strike back with force, she said.  

Auguiste also said she found it hard to believe that Church -- who she knew by his middle name, Jacob -- is the same person described in charging documents as remarking about the sight of a “cop on fire.” Rather, she remembers Church as a soft-spoken artist who liked making still-life sketches and opposed the National Defense Authorization Act on constitutional grounds.

“He’s not the kind of person who had the desire to commit violent acts toward anyone,” Auguiste said of Church. “He believed in peaceful protest.”

Both Church and Betterly had lived in South Florida. Their friend, Chase, was from New Hampshire. Auguiste said she only met him once but found him to be “extremely friendly, very warm.”

Chase and Betterly have had brushes with the law. According to a Reuters report, Chase was charged with attempt to commit assault and reckless endangerment in June 2003, after he pulled a knife in a fight with another man. The report also detailed an incident a month later where Chase was in another fight, after which he hit a man with his car. The man wasn’t injured, but Chase was reportedly found guilty of assault.

(Chase’s uncle, Michael Chase of Westmoreland, N.H., told the Union-Leader newspaper that his nephew had only become politically active when the Occupy Wall Street protests bloomed. Of the charges, he said, “Seems outrageous and completely out of character for him. … He’s no angel. He’s not happy with the economy. Nobody is.”)

Last October Betterly was charged for burglary of an unoccupied structure, grand theft and criminal mischief when after a night of drinking, he and two friends broke into an Oakland Park, Fla., school to swim in the pool, according to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. Those felony charges are still pending. 

Olivia Ferguson

Olivia Ferguson, 36, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., said she believes the charges against Betterly "about as much as I believe in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy."

Olivia Ferguson, 36, said she often shared a tent with Betterly on the plaza adjoining the Fort Lauderdale City Hall during the Occupy protests. An electrician, Betterly would sometimes visit the encampment overnight after having worked 16 hours that same day, she said.

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“I believe Brent is a terrorist about as much as I believe in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy,” said Ferguson, from Fort Lauderdale. Recalling Betterly’s fondness for drinking, she believes that the home-brewing kit allegedly being used to make Molotov cocktails was probably just for making beer. Recalling his blond dreadlocks and goofy charm, Ferguson said she gave Betterly the nickname “Spicoli,” after Sean Penn’s party hearty character in “Fast Times at Ridgemont High.”

At one Occupy Fort Lauderdale meeting in October led by Ferguson and Betterly, a man in the group spoke up to advocate more forceful forms of protest – spray-painting and property destruction. “Brent and I said absolutely not,” Ferguson said. “We were totally against that.”

Another Occupy activist, Mike Howson, 25, said he was “really surprised” to see Betterly’s name surface in connection with a terrorist act. “Like most of us, there were political things you’d bitch about, but he didn’t seem like the kind of guy who would actually go through with something like that.”

Michael Howson

Mike Howson, 25, of Sunrise, Fla., said Betterly "didn't seem like the kind of guy who would actually go through with something like that."

Howson, who resides in Sunrise, Fla., remembered Church being more reserved than the outgoing Betterly-- the type who “observes before he interacts with people.”

One activist who met Betterly and Church in Florida, and spoke about them on condition of anonymity, was not as surprised as their other fellow protesters, saying they were more inclined than most to push the limits of peaceful protest, 

“Jacob (Church) was immature and he was angry -- that’s a dangerous combination,” the activist said. 

The same activist was more surprised that Betterly was implicated in the plot, but recalled his increasing frustration when the Fort Lauderdale movement cleared out its camp in December.

“He went to Washington, D.C. for that national Occupy convention,” said the activist. “He then stayed near McPherson Square, and I can only surmise that he became somewhat radicalized by people he met there, because when he was here he was very much committed to nonviolence.”

facebook.com

Evan Rowe said suspect Brent Betterly "didn't seem to have a coherent ideological motivation, but he was tactically eager to pursue actions which might get him arrested in the pursuit of the Occupy cause."

Evan Rowe, 34, who met Betterly through Occupy Fort Lauderdale, answered questions via email. “Brent was always super-eager and hard core,” he said. “He didn’t seem to have a coherent ideological motivation, but he was tactically eager to pursue actions which might get him arrested in the pursuit of the Occupy cause.”

In Rowe’s opinion, the arrests were a “public relations exercise” by law enforcement agencies that need to invent sophisticated terrorist plots to justify their out-sized budgets, he said.

In a statement to reporters Saturday, Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez said that the investigation of the NATO bombing plot had been going on for weeks and that the Chicago Police detectives were assisted by the FBI and U.S. Secret Service. Alvarez called the men “domestic terrorists” who had come to Chicago “to hurt people.”

Kris Hermes, a spokesman for the National Lawyers Guild, which is representing the three accused bombers, said Sunday that prosecutors have yet to show evidence to support police claims of terrorist acts. “This is a direct attempt to stifle protest and to turn the public opinion against peaceful protesters.”

Defense attorneys hope to learn more about the state’s case at a court hearing Tuesday. “We strongly believe that undercover cops in this case were manufacturing crimes,” said Hermes. “They were provoking these guys to do things that they would not have otherwise done -- and it’s not even clear that they did engage in any criminal activities.”

Hermes said that the same two undercover cops who busted Betterly, Chase and Church were behind the bust of Sebastian Senakiewicz and Mark Neiweem, both of Chicago. Senakiewicz was charged with falsely making a terrorist threat while Neiweem stands accused of attempted possession of an explosive device. Police have said the two plots were unrelated.

Sunday afternoon, thousands of protesters marched from Jackson Drive and Columbus Drive, near Lake Michigan, to McCormick Place, the setting for the NATO Summit. Some 60 countries are sending delegations to the event, where diplomats are discussing the war in Afghanistan and missile defense in Europe.

There were reports of clashes between protesters and police at the conclusion of the march, but it appears that the demonstration was largely peaceful.

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Jared Chase, Brian Church, Brent Vincent Betterly, Sebastian Senakiewicz, Mark Neiweem were charged in Cook County Court for preparing explosives or making threats during the NATO summit this weekend.

Updated at 4:55 p.m. ET: CHICAGO -- Prosecutors said Sunday they have charged two more people as part their investigation into activists who planned to take part in demonstrations at the two-day NATO summit.

The Cook County State's Attorney's office said Sebastian Senakiewicz, 24, a native of Poland who lives in Chicago, is charged with falsely making a terrorist threat. Mark Neiweem, 28, who authorities believe to be from Chicago, is charged with attempted possession of explosives or incendiary devices.

Senakiewicz had bragged about having explosives, a prosecutor told a judge, claiming that he hid them in a hollowed-out Harry Potter book. But searches did not find any explosives, the prosecutor said.

The men were scheduled to make an initial court appearance later Sunday, when prosecutors were expected to offer more details about their allegations. Also expected in court Sunday is a third man, Taylor Hall, who was arrested during protests on Saturday night and is charged with aggravated battery to a police officer. Authorities did not immediately release Hall's age or hometown.

Three other activists appeared in court and were accused of manufacturing Molotov cocktails and having plans to attack President Barack Obama's campaign headquarters and other targets during the NATO protests.

Kris Hermes, a spokesman for the National Lawyers Guild, which has represented many of the activists pro bono, said the new charges were an "effort to frighten people and to diminish the size of the demonstrations."

Hermes said dozens of lawyers had donated their time over the weekend and that hundreds had called the guild's hotline. By Sunday morning, they had represented 37 people who had been arrested.

He said one man was clubbed over the head, causing heavy bleeding, and that another was transported to the hospital after being run over by a police van. That man, Hermes said, was shackled to his gurney during the four hours he was at the hospital.

Hermes said that while the five cases may not be related, his group believes the same police informants turned them in.

The trio charged Saturday are Brian Church, 20, of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.; Jared Chase, 24, of Keene, N.H.; and, Brent Vincent Betterly, 24, of Oakland Park, Fla. They were arrested on Wednesday and face felony charges of conspiracy to commit terrorism, material support for terrorism and possession of explosives.

Senakiewicz was arrested a day later and there was no immediate indication that he had links to Church, Chase or Betterly. It also wasn't clear when Neiweem was arrested and if he had any links to the other charged activists.

Defense lawyer Michael Deutsch on Saturday accused police of setting up their clients in an attempt to frighten peaceful protesters. He said undercover officers brought the firebombs to a South Side apartment where the men were arrested.

Critics say filing terrorism-related charges against the protesters is reminiscent of previous police actions ahead of major political events, when authorities moved quickly to prevent suspected plots but sometimes quietly dropped the charges later.

"Even if charges are dropped or reduced later, they will have succeeded in spreading fear and intimidation," Hermes said.

Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy on Saturday flatly dismissed the idea the arrests of the initial three suspects were anything more than an effort to stop "an imminent threat."

Prosecutors said Church, Chase and Betterly used fuel purchased from a Chicago gas station for makeshift bombs, pouring it into beer bottles and cutting up bandanas to serve as fuses. If convicted on all counts, they could get up to 85 years in prison. They are each being held on $1.5 million bond.

Msnbc.com's Isolde Raftery contributed to this report.

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Updated 9 p.m. ET: CHICAGO -- Dozens of anti-war veterans tossed their medals onto a Chicago street Sunday near where NATO began its two-day summit, calling them “representations of hate,” “lies” and “cheap tokens,” and with some making emotional pleas for forgiveness from the people of Iraq and Afghanistan.

With many dressed in military fatigues, they had filed through the streets in formation, chanting "N-A-T-O, NATO has got to go," and “No NATO, no war, we don't work for you no more,” leading about 2,000 protesters on a 2.5-mile march.

After “retiring” an American flag they carried through the streets and giving it to a woman whose soldier son committed suicide, they began hurtling their war service medals into the air -- a rare form of protest that was last done on a large scale by 900 Vietnam veterans in 1971.

The protesters cheered the post 9/11-era veterans on, clapping and yelling, “give them back!”

"I choose human life over war," Jerry Bordeleau shouted through a microphone, before tossing the medals onto the street.

Adrees Latif / Reuters

Veterans raise their hands in solidarity after throwing their medals towards the site of the NATO Summit in Chicago on Sunday.

Members of Afghans for Peace stood alongside the veterans, holding the Afghan flag and making speeches, too.

“All we have is this flag, but not our sovereign land. I’d like to direct my message to the NATO representatives here in Chicago today. For what you’ve done to my home country, I’m enraged; for what you’ve done to my people, I’m disgusted; for what you’ve done to these veterans, I’m heartbroken,” said Suraia Sahar. “I sympathize with their disappointment and being failed by the system and having their lives, their morals and humanity, toiled with.”

Another man said he was representing deserters who can’t come back to the U.S. and threw many of their medals away.

NATO summit prompts little buzz on streets of Kabul

Steven Acheson, an Army veteran who before the march said he had been waiting a long time for this moment, though he was also anxious about it, threw away his medals for the children of Iraq and Afghanistan.

“May they be able to forgive us for what we have done to them, may we begin to heal and may we live in peace from here till eternity,” he said.

Organizers had hoped 10,000 people would attend the 2.5-mile march that ended near McCormick Place, the convention center where NATO is meeting. But a Chicago city official put the crowd at around 2,000. 

After the nearly three-hour march, skirmishes broke out between riot police and a small group of so-called "black bloc" protesters trying to push their way closer to the summit site. Members of the crowd, some wearing bandanas over their faces, threw large sticks, liquids and bottles at the police. Officers handcuffed several protesters and dragged them away.

Police arrested 45 people and four officers were injured, including one who was stabbed in the leg, said Police Supt. Garry McCarthy, according to NBC Chicago. Authorities were testing a liquid substance found in a backpack, and police used their batons because officers were assaulted, he said.

During the two-day summit, leaders of NATO's 28-member nations were to discuss the strategy for ensuring a peaceful Afghanistan after the United States removes its combat troops by 2014.

Michael Mizner, 25, of Wilmington, Del., watched as the veterans tossed their medals.

“As a former Marine, it was hard to watch and listen to,” he said, noting that the statement about the war being a lie hit home. “It’s too true. It’s heartbreaking to think about.”

Returning the medals – even those that are given just for showing up to the theater of conflict, as are some of the ones the veterans threw away – is not without controversy.

“They’re as much of a disgrace as the veterans back in the Vietnam days that did the same thing,” retired Army 1st Sgt. Troy Steward, who served 22 years and is now a military blogger, said ahead of the protest. “If these veterans aren’t proud of the service that they did … then they should never have accepted them (medals) in the first place.”

Among the crowd that marched with the veterans was Arianna Norris-Landry, of St. Louis, dressed as a turn-of-the-century suffragette. She said she and 60 other women were protesting military action and a sense that women's rights are being targeted by conservatives.

Calling themselves "Grannies at the G8" and "Nanas at NATO," some of the women were dressed as World War II feminist icon Rosie the Riveter, others as 1950s' housewives.

"We need to be feeding our children, not the war machines," said Kellie Stewart, a 47-year-old from Saint Croix Falls, Wis. "We need to keep the money, we don't have housing, we don't have jobs. It's just not right what's going on here at home."

Miranda Leitsinger / msnbc.com

Thousands march through Chicago's streets Sunday in protest of war policies at a two-day NATO summit.

Some protesters had provisions for the march, such as food and water, while others had gas masks and bandanas to ward off the effects of pepper spray and tear gas, should they be used. Some have earplugs to shield against the crowd-control noise devices authorities reportedly have.

Not everyone who turned out was supportive. One person could be heard yelling “losers” and “agitators" about halfway through the march.

Narayan Mahon for msnbc.com

Iraq war veteran Steve Acheson posed at his home in Platteville, Wisc., days before returning his service medals.

Scenes from Chicago protests surrounding NATO summit
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 On Sunday morning, ahead of the march, two activists appeared in court on terrorism-related charges. Cook County prosecutors charged Mark Neiweem, 28, with attempted possession of explosives or incendiary devices and Sebastian Senakiewicz, 24, with falsely making a terrorist threat.

Three others made court appearances on Saturday, accused of assembling Molotov cocktails – firebombs made by filling glass bottles with gasoline – to attack, among other places, President Barack Obama’s campaign headquarters in Chicago.

Their lawyer, Michael Deutsch has denied the charges against them, calling it all a setup and “entrapment to the highest degree” by at least two police informants, while their friends have insisted they were simply operating a home brewery.

Fellow activists express disbelief at arrest of NATO summit bomb plot suspects

Thirty-seven people had been arrested by Sunday morning, said Kris Hermes, a spokesman for the National Lawyers Guild in Chicago. Chicago has assigned 3,100 officers to the NATO summit to protect the city against the sort of violence that broke out in the streets of Seattle at the World Trade Organization meeting in 1999. They are being assisted by hundreds of officers from Milwaukee, Philadelphia and Charlotte-Mecklenburg, N.C., NBCChicago.com reported.

Protester Jason Brock, of San Diego, Calif, drove from New Mexico to Chicago to join the march. A trumpeter, he traded "answers and calls" with a veteran who had also brought his trumpet.

“It’s beyond words really what’s happening here right now. I think we’re maybe making steps toward healing this nation,” said Brock, 44. “I hope we can move forward in a way that’s more peaceful and more positive and we can take … the lesson that these men and women are trying to teach us and bring it home to our own lives.”

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Updated at 8 p.m. ET CHICAGO -- Three anti-NATO protesters charged with terrorism conspiracy planned to attack four Chicago police stations, the local campaign headquarters for President Barack Obama and the home of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, prosecutors alleged in court Saturday.

A fourth man also was charged Saturday, police said, but it was not clear if that case was linked to the other three.

While friends of the first three men insisted they were just operating a home brewery, prosecutors stated that police found a gun that fires mortar rounds, swords, a hunting bow, ninja-like throwing stars and knives with brass knuckle handles.

The beer-brewing operation, prosecutors added, was used to fill bottles with gasoline that would later be thrown as Molotov cocktails.

"Plans were made to destroy police cars and attack four CPD stations with destructive devices, in an effort to undermine the police response" to attacks on the Obama office, the Emanuel home as well as unspecified financial institutions during the NATO summit this weekend, the charging statement said.

The men were identified as 22-year-old Brian Church, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; 27-year-old Jared Chase, of Keene, N.H.; and 24-year-old Brent Betterly, who told police he resides in Massachusetts. 

The three are "self-proclaimed anarchists, and members of the 'Black Bloc' group," prosecutors said, without elaborating.

Michael Deutsch, an attorney for the men, denied that and said the men and their friends were in Chicago to "peaceably protest."

The three were charged with conspiracy to commit terrorism, possession of an explosive or incendiary device and providing material support for terrorism. Bond of $1.5 million was set for each defendant. 

Sebastian Senakiewicz, 24, was arrested at an Odell Avenue residence Thursday by a Chicago police intelligence team. He was charged Saturday with one count of weapons conspiracy. Police said he was conspiring with two or more others to make explosives including molotov cocktails to be used during the NATO summit. It was not immediately clear if he was conspiring with the first three.

Defense attorneys for Church, Chase and Betterly told a judge on Saturday that undercover police were the ones who brought the Molotov cocktails, and that their clients were entrapped.  

Deutsch later told reporters outside the courtroom that, though he was just getting into the case and didn't know all the evidence, he believed it was a setup. At least two informants "ingratiated themselves" with the three men, brought the materials and made the alleged plans, he insisted, calling it "an entrapment to the highest degree."

But Chicago Police Supt. Garry McCarthy told reporters "the evidence speaks for itself" about what he called an "imminent threat."

Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez said the investigation began weeks ago and local authorities had the help of the FBI and the Secret Service.

"The individuals that we have charged in this investigation are not peaceful protesters, they are domestic terrorists ... these men were here to hurt people," Alvarez said. "They were making the bombs ... (and had) directions on how to implement this."

Read the full charging document

The charging document states that "while the Molotov Cocktails were being poured, Church discussed the NATO Summit, the protests, and how the Molotov Cocktails would be used ... At one point, Church asked if others had ever seen a 'cop on fire' and discussed throwing one of the Molotov Cocktails into" a police station.

"Church stated that he also wanted to buy several assault rifles, and indicated that if a police officer was going to point a gun at him, then Church would be 'pointing one back'," the document states.

Six others initially arrested were released Friday. They were all detained in a raid Wednesday on a home in Bridgeport on Chicago's South Side, NBCChicago.com reported.

Overall, 14 people have been arrested in the lead up to the summit, McCarthy said. When asked if more arrests were expected in this case, he said he was "not positive," though he noted the investigation was ongoing. 

But the group of protesters said what police thought was suspicious was actually a home beer-brewing operation.

"We were handcuffed to a bench and our legs were shackled together. We were not told what was happening," one of those detained but later released, Darrin Ammussek, told NBCChicago.com. "I believe very strongly in non-violence, and if I had seen anything that even resembled any plans or anything like that, we wouldn’t have been there."

Scenes from Chicago protests surrounding NATO summit

He claimed that during 18 hours in custody, police never told him why he was arrested, read him his rights or allowed him to make a phone call, The Associated Press reported. He said he remained handcuffed to a bench, even after asking to use a restroom. 

"There were guards walking by making statements into the door along the lines of 'hippie,' 'communist,' 'pinko,'" a tired-looking Ammussek told reporters just after his release. 

Security has been high throughout the city in preparation for the summit, where delegations from about 60 countries, including 50 heads of state, will discuss the war in Afghanistan and European missile defense. 

US veterans to return war medals in protest

Among the pre-NATO protests was a march on the home of Mayor Emanuel by about 500 people on Saturday. The big show will be on Sunday, the start of the two-day NATO summit, when thousands of protesters are expected to march 2½ miles from a band shell on Lake Michigan to the McCormick Place convention center, where delegates will be meeting. 

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Tannen Maury / EPA

Members of National Nurses United rally in Daley Plaza on Friday, ahead of the NATO Summit in Chicago.

A coalition of nurses’ unions is calling for a “Robin Hood” tax on Wall Street, which they say could generate up to $350 billion a year, in the first major protest ahead of this weekend’s NATO summit in Chicago.

Their pitch: impose a tax of 50 cents on every $100 of trades of stocks, bonds, dividends and other financial transactions, which are not currently taxed. The U.S. would join more than a dozen other nations that already have a financial transaction tax, according to National Nurses United (NNU).

"I've been asked many, many times ... 'What are you doing here as nurses? ... What do you have to do with the economy?'" Karen Higgins, a registered nurse and co-president of NNU, said to the crowd in Chicago's Daley Plaza.  

"We're watching this every day. We're watching patients suffer," she said, noting that nurses were seeing people without insurance or others who can't afford their co-pays, as well as a spike in the number of children with adult diseases due to eating poorly because their parents can't afford healthy food. "This is serious and in some cases it is actually deadly."

Storify: Scenes from the NATO summit protests

"We know the solution .. we are watching and seeing Wall Street throwing our money away as we see people suffer and die. It will not continue," she said. "We pay sales tax. It is time for Wall Street to start paying back what they owe the rest of the country and they need to pay sales tax."

The nurses’ call echoes last fall’s outcry by the Occupy Wall Street protesters over income equality, corruption and corporate greed. Proceeds from the Wall Street tax would support social services, education and healthcare.

The financial transaction tax is not a new concept. The U.S. had one from 1914 to 1966, and several politicians called for another one after the Wall Street crash in 1987, National Nurses United said.

Supporters include Nobel Laureate economists Paul Krugman, a New York Times columnist, and Joseph Stiglitz, the former World Bank chief economist -- both of whom have spoken out in favor of such a tax in the past.

A bill introduced last November by two U.S. Democratic lawmakers, Sen. Tom Harkin and Rep. Peter DeFazio, calls for a tax of 0.03 percent -- or 3 cents on every $100 -- on most non-consumer financial trading including stocks, bonds and other debts. It would raise more than $43 billion a year, according to DeFazio's office, which cited analysis from Congress' Joint Committee on Taxation.

Others, however, are against what has been called a “sin” tax on Wall Street.

“Our research shows unambiguously that higher trading costs depress the prices of stocks and bonds,” business school professors Yakov Amihud and Haim Mendelson  wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. “A transactions tax will end up punishing Main Street, hurting the economy and reducing U.S. Treasury revenues in the next few years. It will thus exacerbate the effects of the financial crisis.”

The tax proposal protesters were initially targeting the G8 summit of global financial leaders that starts today. But when that meeting was moved from Chicago to Camp David in Maryland, they opted to carry on their demonstrations here anyway to take advantage of the large number of protesters converging on the city for the NATO summit.

Mary O'Sullivan, 72, came to the protest with her husband Chris Fogarty, 77. The retired married couple each held a sign, one reading "Honk To Indict Banksters" and the other "Stop Gov't Crimes."

"We're hoping that even at this late date the government will recognize that there is so much pain and suffering amongst the people that they will at least start paying attention," O'Sullivan said, noting she had recently spoken with a woman at a city mental health care facility that's being closed down. "She has no idea where she is going to go or how she is going to get there, and in the meantime, we're spending millions of dollars on drones to kill people."

Earlier this week, protesters demonstrated against the shuttering of local schools and mental health clinics, the loss of homes through foreclosures, and environmental issues surrounding the controversial “Tar Sands” pipeline, and they stormed the building that houses the headquarters of President Obama’s campaign.

Nam Y. Huh / AP

Demonstrators rally against the Keystone Pipeline and the Alberta Tar Sands outside of the Canadian Consulate in downtown Chicago on Thursday.

The city has assigned 3,100 officers plus hundreds from other cities to guard against the kind of violence that broke out in the streets of Seattle at the World Trade Organization meeting in 1999, NBCChicago.com reported, and officials have warned of massive travel disruptions.

They’ve also imposed limits on how close the protesters, which include dozens of unions and anti-war, environmental, education, healthcare and civil liberties’ groups, can get to the convention center where the summit is being held -- within “sight and sound” of it, according to the Chicago Tribune -- raising the ire of the demonstrators.

The National Lawyers Guild, which is sending out legal observers to the demonstrations and aiding those who are detained, said late Thursday that at least 20 people have been arrested so far this week. Occupy Chicago said 11 arrests occurred Wednesday night at an area home – though it’s not clear if those 11 were included in the guild’s tally. 

Organizers expect the biggest crowds at a rally led by anti-war activists on Sunday, in which a group of 9/11-era veterans plan to return their service medals to protest the "war on terror."

Todd Gitlin, a former leader of the 1960s-era group Students for a Democratic Society and a Columbia University sociology and journalism professor, said the Wall Street tax was an obvious focus for protesters.

“It’s concrete. It might be winnable. It has global resonance because you’ve got  … several national governments in Europe that support it,” he said, noting that it clearly distinguishes between the 99 percent and the 1 percent, and had an “intrinsic fairness” about it. “It’s a reform that rings sensible to large numbers of people but a lot of work has to be done… . Most people right now I think don’t get it.”

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