Yes, it IS reasonable for Defund events to demand police protection!!
Let us suppose (hypothetically) that you hired a maid with the expectation that she would clean the place – but instead of cleaning, she would do all kinds of things that made a mess of the place. To make matters worse, let us assume that you did not have the authority to fire her yourself, but needed permission from a board to fire her – and the board was reluctant to approve of such an action.
Now, let us translate this to the scenario that many minority communities in real life face with the police.