Authorities in Charlotte, North Carolina, braced on Wednesday (September 21) for a possible second night of rioting triggered by the police killing of a black man who refused commands to drop a handgun that officers said he was brandishing.
Protesters took the streets of Charlotte chanting “no justice, no peace” a day after sixteen police were injured overnight on Tuesday and one person was arrested as officers in riot gear clashed with demonstrators who hurled stones, set fires and briefly blocked an interstate highway.
Police and protesters offered widely differing accounts of the shooting. Officers said Keith Scott, 43, was armed and ignoring orders, while the victim’s family and a witness said he was holding a book. Authorities have not released any video of the incident, but say they plan to.
The trouble in Charlotte unfolded as demonstrators in Tulsa, Oklahoma, demanded the arrest of a police officer seen on video fatally shooting an unarmed black man who had his hands in clear view at the time.
The deaths were the latest to raise questions of racial bias in U.S. law enforcement, and they stoked a national debate on policing ahead of the presidential election in November.
Police shootings in cities including New York, Chicago and Ferguson, Missouri, have sparked more than two years of largely peaceful protests punctuated by days of rioting and arson and given rise to the Black Lives Matter civil rights movement.
(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2016