By Scott Malone and Ian Simpson

BALTIMORE (Reuters) - The city of Baltimore was on Sunday to observe a day of prayer two weeks after a 25-year-old black man died of injuries suffered in police custody in a case that has led to criminal charges against six officers.

Freddie Gray's death last month was the latest in a string of police killings of unarmed black men that have sparked anger and protests across the United States over the past year. But in a sharp departure from many prior incidents, Baltimore prosecutors found the officers had broken the law both in arresting Gray and in roughly handling him.

"What happened in Baltimore sets the bar for prosecutors across the country," said State Senator Catherine Pugh. "It raises the standard of what you can do."

After a day of violence on Monday, when rioters torched buildings and cars and threw rocks at police, the mostly black city of 620,000 people has seen a week of largely peaceful demonstrations and marchers that swelled into the thousands of people on Friday and Saturday after charges were brought.

Maryland's Governor, Larry Hogan, called for a day of prayer and reconciliation on Sunday.

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Demonstrators cheer in the intersection of West North and Pennsylvania Avenues in Baltimore on Satur …

"As we begin to rebuild and restore, let us renew our faith in the true spirit of our city and its people," Hogan said. "I pray that tomorrow will be a day of reflection."

On Friday, prosecutor Marilyn Mosby said the Maryland state medical examiner had ruled Gray's death a homicide. She said he was unlawfully arrested and the officers repeatedly ignored his pleas for medical help while he was handcuffed, shackled and lying face down in the back of a police van.

Investigations of police killings of unarmed black men last year in Ferguson, Missouri, and New York had concluded the officers involved had acted within the law, triggering waves of sometimes violent protests.

Gene Ryan, president of the Baltimore Fraternal Order of Police, said he was disappointed with "the apparent rush to judgment" in charging the officers.

Police on Saturday arrested at least a dozen people for violating the 10 p.m. curfew that has been in place since Tuesday night. They were a tiny fraction of the thousands who marched through the city's streets for hours.

Officers in patrol uniforms, rather than riot gear, mingled with the crowd for much of the evening at an intersection where buildings had been burned in Monday's rioting. Police and citizens chatted amiably, in a possible sign of improving relations.

Travis Robertson, a 33-year-old law student, spoke to one officer.

"At first, I didn't want to listen to her because I have had bad experiences with police...," Robertson said. "But as we talked, I could see that she was one of the good ones. There are definitely bad officers out there, but there are good ones too."

(Reporting by Scott Malone; editing by John Stonestreet)

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NYPD officer shot in Queens, now in critical condition

NEW YORK (AP) — A man accused of shooting a New York City police officer in the head will be arraigned Sunday on charges including two counts of attempted murder of a police officer, officials said.

Demetrius Blackwell was arrested Saturday night in the shooting of Officer Brian Moore, who remained hospitalized in critical but stable condition.

Blackwell, 35, was expected to be arraigned Sunday afternoon, the Queens district attorney's office said. It was not clear if he had a lawyer.

Moore, 25, was rushed to a hospital in a patrol car after he and his partner pulled up in an unmarked police car to a man who was adjusting his waistband suspiciously, police Commissioner William Bratton said.

The officers exchanged words with the man before he turned suddenly and fired at least twice, striking Moore, Bratton said. His partner, Officer Erik Jansen, radioed for help.

"They did not have an opportunity to get out and return fire," the commissioner said at a Saturday night news conference at Jamaica Hospital Medical Center with Mayor Bill de Blasio and other officials.

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Police work in a neighborhood in the Queens borough of New York on Saturday, May 2, 2015 after an NY …

After the shooting, witnesses described Blackwell to responding officers and pointed them in the direction he ran, Bratton said. Officers searched house by house and some could be seen walking on roofs as helicopters flew overhead.

Police arrested Blackwell near the crime scene in a house on the block where he lives, officials said.

De Blasio said the shooting was a painful reminder of the risks officers take every day.

"Our hearts are with his family, his loved ones," the mayor said. "Our hearts are with his extended family, the men and women of the NYPD."

Moore, who comes from a family of police officers, has been on the job since July 2010.

The shooting instantly evoked fears of the December slayings of two uniformed officers as they sat in their patrol cars in Brooklyn by a man who posted online that he was seeking retribution against officers for the death of Eric Garner in an apparent chokehold by police.

The shootings of Officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos strained an already tense relationship between city police unions and de Blasio. Patrolmen's Benevolent Association President Patrick Lynch turned his back on the mayor at a hospital the day of the killings and said de Blasio had "blood on his hands."

But Saturday night, Lynch was among the officials who attended the news conference and could be seen shaking the mayor's hand and speaking briefly with him afterward.

Bratton said Blackwell has a criminal record that includes a weapons possession charge, but the suspect made no such anti-police postings and was being pursued by the anti-crime officers because of his behavior.

Neighbors near the scene of the shooting were surprised by the violence and described the residential area with many two- and three-family homes as quiet and safe.

"You walk down the street, no trouble," said Sandreaus Adam, 52. "This is not a neighborhood where you're just going to hear shots."

___

Associated Press writers Jake Pearson and Tom Hays contributed to this report.

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Raw: Italy Rescues More Than 3,000 Migrants

By Steve Scherer

ROME (Reuters) - Nearly 4,500 migrants were plucked from boats off the coast of Libya over the weekend and 10 bodies were recovered, Italy's coast guard and navy said, in what looked to be the biggest rescue mission of its kind so far this year.

Two weeks after nearly 900 boat people drowned in the worst Mediterranean shipwreck in living memory, the flow of people from Africa desperate to reach a better life in Europe has accelerated, as people smugglers take advantage of calmer seas.

Seven bodies were found on two large rubber boats packed with migrants and rescuers plucked from the sea the corpses of three others who had jumped into the water when they saw a merchant ship approaching, the coast guard said.

Separately, authorities in Egypt said that three died when a migrant boat attempting to reach Greece sank off its coast. Thirty-one people were rescued.

Some 10 Italian vessels, four private boats and a French ship acting on behalf of the European border control agency took part in the rescue off Libya, coordinated by Italy, the country that receives the biggest number of Mediterranean migrants.

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Migrants arrive at the Lampedusa island harbor early Sunday, May 3, 2015. Ships rescued 3,690 migran …

The private Migrant Offshore Aid Station, which runs one rescue ship in partnership with Doctors Without Borders, said on Twitter it had saved 369 migrants, mainly from Eritrea, from a single overcrowded wooden boat.

DISAGREEMENT

All of those rescued were being brought to Italian shores, some already arriving at Lampedusa, Italy's southernmost island, and others at Trapani, Sicily. More were to be brought ashore overnight and on Monday.

Shocked by last month's record disaster, European Union leaders agreed to triple funding for the EU sea patrol mission Triton, but there is still disagreement on what to do with the people fleeing conflict and poverty in various parts of Africa and the Middle East.

Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann said in a newspaper interview on Sunday that the EU should set up a quota system whereby member countries agree to take in more refugees in order to relieve some of the pressure on Italy, Greece and Malta.

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Migrants board a bus after arriving at the Lampedusa island early Sunday, May 3, 2015. Ships rescued …

But Austria's proposal is likely to face tough opposition from some members states, including Britain and Hungary.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Friday that EU states should be allowed to set their own rules on migrants, and that Hungary did not want any of them.

Growing lawlessness and anarchy in Libya is giving free hand to people smugglers who make an average of 80,000 euros ($90,000) from each boatload, according to an ongoing investigation by an Italian court.

Mild spring weather and calm summer seas are expected to push total arrivals in Italy for 2015 to 200,000, an increase of 30,000 on last year, according to an Interior Ministry projection. Almost 2,000 are estimated to have perished during the crossing already this year.

($1 = 0.8929 euros)

(Editing by Robin Pomeroy)