The killing of a young black man by police on Tuesday in the US
state of Missouri joins a long list of similar incidents which have
stoked racial tensions:
July 17:
African American father-of-six Eric Garner, 43, dies after being held in
a police chokehold while he is being arrested for selling individual
cigarettes illegally in New York. A coroner declares the death a
homicide, but a grand jury opts not to charge the white officer
involved, unleashing demonstrations in several cities.
August 9:
A white police officer kills an unarmed black teenager, aspiring
college student Michael Brown, 18, unleashing ten days of protests and
riots and heavy-handed police tactics in Ferguson, Missouri. The later
decision not to indict the police officer, Darren Wilson, prompts riots
in Ferguson and raises racial tensions.
November 20:
An unarmed black man, Akai Gurley, 28, a father of a young daughter, is
shot by a white police officer who opens fire in a dimly lit staircase
at a Brooklyn, New York apartment block. On the day of his funeral on
December 7, New Yorkers take to the streets to denounce the spate of
police killings.
November 22: In
Cleveland, Ohio, a video of US police officers shooting dead Tamir Rice,
a 12-year-old black boy carrying a replica gun seconds after
confronting him stokes anger.
December 23: Police
say they shot dead an African American teenager in the town of Berkley,
near Ferguson. Police said an officer opened fire on the teen who was
carrying a handgun at a petrol station, hitting him several times and
killing him.
In another drama, on December 20 an
African American gunman with an apparent grudge kills two New York
police officers, Wenjian Liu, 32 and Rafael Ramos, 40.
They
are shot in cold blood in the head in their car parked in front of an
poor apartment block in Brooklyn. Their killer, a suspected member of
the "Black Guerilla Family" gang, which is known to the police, then
commits suicide on the platform of a subway station.
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