US protests: Protester shot dead as US violence escalates
A gun-carrying anti-racism protester has been killed in Texas after a car drove through crowds firing shots. It comes as police clashed with protesters and tensions continued to rise in the US.
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A anti-racism protester has been shot dead in Texas by a driver who sped toward the crowd before opening fire on Saturday night (local time).
According to US reports, the man - who was reportedly carrying an AK-47 machine gun - was pushing his quadruple amputee fiancee in her wheelchair just moments before he was gunned down.
The dead man has been identified as Garrett Foster, whose mother, Sheila, spoke to Good Morning America on Sunday (local time).
Foster’s mother said her son had attended several protests with his fiancee Whitney Mitchell, and that the couple had been together since they were 17.
Garrett Foster, the Black Lives Matter supporter who was shot and killed tonight in Austin, TX, was interviewed with his AK47.
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) July 26, 2020
pic.twitter.com/fb0kNL0sij
Before Foster was fatally shot, he was seen speaking to local media about why he was carrying his AK-47.
In the video, Foster is heard saying: “They don’t let us march in the streets anymore so gotta practice some of our rights.”
Texas authorities said a suspect had been detained in connection to the shooting and is “no longer a threat to the community”.
CAR DRIVES THROUGH CROWD IN DENVER
It comes as a car drove through a crowd and a protester was shot in the suburban Denver suburb of Aurora during demonstrations against racial injustice.
The Aurora Police Department said on Twitter that protesters were walking on a local highway on Saturday (local time) when a vehicle drove through.
Police said a protester fired a weapon, striking at least one person who was taken to a hospital in stable condition.
Authorities said the vehicle was towed and they are investigating. Protesters also broke windows to the courthouse and a fire was started in an office, police said. An unlawful assembly was declared and police ordered protesters to leave the area, authorities said.
Tensions have been heightened at recent protests against racial injustice since federal officials were sent to quell demonstrations in Portland, Oregon. Police declared a riot in Seattle on Saturday.
Protests sparked by the May 25 death of George Floyd, a black man in Minnesota who died after a white officer held him to the ground with a knee to his neck, have also highlighted other cases of fatal police violence.
BREAKING:
— Dillon Thomas (@DillonMThomas) July 26, 2020
Aurora Police confirm a shooting took place on I-225 as a vehicle made its way through protestors.
A protestors fired multiple shots afterward, striking at least one other protestor.@CBSDenver #ElijahMcClain #JusticeForElijahMcClain https://t.co/wC4gqsVVTu pic.twitter.com/8OWnQg0UzU
In Colorado, protesters have been drawing attention to the death of Elijah McClain, who was stopped by police while walking down an Aurora street in August 2019 after a 911 caller reported him as suspicious. Police placed him in a chokehold, and paramedics administered 500 milligrams of ketamine, a sedative, to calm him down. He went into cardiac arrest, was later declared brain dead and taken off life support.
PROTESTERS CLASH WITH POLICE AS US TENSIONS RISE
It comes as tensions rose across the US as protests continued in the wake of Floyd’s death. Police used flashbang grenades, pepper spray and tear gas as protesters marched in cities across the country amid a wave of public anger over US President Donald Trump’s planned “surge” of federal agents into major metropolises.
The demonstrations against racism and police brutality — sparked by the death in Minneapolis of unarmed African-American George Floyd — come as the US president faces an increasingly tough battle for re-election, and is campaigning heavily on a platform of “law and order”.
Protesters marched in Austin, Texas, as well as Louisville in Kentucky, New York, Omaha, California’s Oakland and Los Angeles, and Richmond in Virginia — where riot police fired chemical agents at a Black Lives Matter march, according to US media.
In Seattle the sounds of repeated small detonations rang out in some streets, and smoke rose from an area where demonstrators had set fire to trailers by a construction site for a youth detention facility, according to reports.
Protesters slashed car tires and smashed trailer windows.
Police in riot gear faced off against the protesters, some holding umbrellas against falling pellets of pepper spray.
Late Saturday, Seattle Police said 45 people were arrested in connection with the demonstrations, which they designated a riot, according to the force’s official Twitter account.
Police Chief Carmen Best implored people to “come in peace to the city,” and castigated the demonstrations.
“The rioters had no regard for the community’s safety, for officers’ safety or for the businesses and property that they destroyed,” local media reported her as saying.
FEDERAL AGENT ‘SURGE’
The latest violence came after police and federal agents fired tear gas and forcefully dispersed protesters further south in Portland early Saturday, also in anger over Mr Trump’s heavily-criticised surge of security forces.
The city, the biggest in the state of Oregon, has seen nightly protests against racism and police brutality for nearly two months, initially sparked by Floyd’s death.
Portland is also a stage for the highly controversial crackdown by federal agents ordered by Mr Trump — one that is not supported by local officials, and which many say smacks of authoritarianism.
Saturday’s demonstration began peacefully, with crowds playing music and dancing, blowing soap bubbles and attaching red roses to the barricades.
But it ended — like many before it — with tear gas fired after protesters attached ropes to barricades surrounding the city’s courthouse in an attempt to pull them down.
Portland police declared the area a riot, ordering protesters to leave, before they were joined by federal officers to clear the area.
Reporters saw at least two men being detained and escorted from the scene by federal officers.
Portland police earlier confirmed a man was stabbed, with the suspect “held down by protesters” before he was detained by officers and charged with assault, according to a statement.
The victim was transported to hospital with a serious injury.
Earlier, protesters complained of the federal agents in the city and voiced their support for the Black Lives Matter movement.
“I don’t like what’s happening down here, what Trump is doing,” Mike Shikany, a 55-year-old aerospace engineer, said, adding he did not “want to get anywhere near the little green men,” meaning the federal soldiers.
Portland retiree Jean Mullen, 74, said that without pressure nothing would change.
“It’s time to become the country we always brag about being. And we can’t brag anymore, about anything. We aren’t first in anything and it’s a terrible, terrible thing to see at the end of my life,” she said.
The inspector general of the US Justice Department on Thursday opened an official investigation into the federal crackdown, but an Oregon federal judge on Friday rejected a legal bid by the state to stop agents from detaining protesters.
Mr Trump last week announced a “surge” of federal agents to crime hot spots including Chicago, following an increase in violence in the nation’s third-largest city.
Agents deployed there will partner with local law enforcement, not riot control forces as seen in Portland.
Local officials have warned they would draw the line at any Portland-style deployment.
– with staff writers
Originally published as US protests: Protester shot dead as US violence escalates