Riot police officers were dispatched to quell the crowds, which were largely calm by 9:30 p.m. The protesters created two big bonfires by tossing cardboard into the street and setting it ablaze, and later set a police car on fire. It was removed, still smoldering, around 11 p.m.

A routine traffic stop of a 75-year-old Hasidic driver in Brooklyn escalated into a protest last night by hundreds of Orthodox Jews, who surrounded a police station house, chanted "No justice no peace," lighted bonfires and set a police car afire. The driver and two other men were arrested, but no serious injuries were reported.

The police said the situation began around 6:30 p.m. when officers pulled over the man, identified by neighbors as Arthur Schick, for talking on his cellphone while driving on 16th Avenue at 47th Street in Borough Park.

The driver became uncooperative and was arrested, the police said. As he was being put into a police van, two other men tried to intervene and were also arrested.

Residents of the neighborhood said Mr. Schick is known to be deaf in one ear. Many said they suspected that he did not hear the police officers' requests for his license and registration when they first stopped his car.