Police at a protest in Oregon saw more than they bargained for when a naked woman placed herself between them and the protesters.
The woman, dubbed 'Naked Athena' on Twitter, was captured on camera sauntering towards the camo-clad police on Friday night.
Wearing only a face mask and a beanie the woman paced the pavement before sitting on the road with her legs spread.
Dave Killen, a photographer for The Oregonian, said onlookers were "astounded".
Killen claims police shot pepper balls at the woman's feet.
"It would have been incredibly painful to be shot with any of those munitions with no clothes on."
Social media users were in awe of the woman, saying she was "an icon of freedom".
"This will be right up there in history of the pic of the guy with the tanks in Tiananmen Square," wrote one Twitter user.
The woman's unusual protest comes amid months of civil unrest in the US following the death of George Floyd at the hands of the white police officer.
Across the country people are marching to protest the systemic racism which enables black people to be more frequently brutalised and killed by police.
