Protests in New York city a court verdict clearing a white officer for the shooting of an unarmed black teenager Michael Brown, Tuesday November 25, 2014 (Photo: Nadeen Shaker)
People took to the streets in cities across the US for the second day on Tuesday to protest a court verdict clearing a white officer of the shooting of an unarmed black teenager in the predominantly black city of Ferguson, Missouri.
Darren Wilson shot and killed Brown on 9 August.
Upon hearing the verdict, angry protesters stormed the area around Ferguson Police Department. Flames ravaged police cruisers, cars, and at least a dozen buildings. Police fired canisters of tear gas and smoke bombs at raucous crowds of protesters in an effort to disperse them. Some shops were looted.
The verdict fuelled nationwide protests in a country where racial tensions run high and police shootings of unarmed blacks are becoming a pattern. Major cities such as New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Oakland, Seattle, California, and Washington, D.C staged protests. Michigan, Maine, Georgia, Texas, amongst others also formed rallies.
In New York alone, massive marches traversed boroughs, gathering at Manhattan’s Union Square and spilling into Brooklyn or other areas on Monday and Tuesday evenings. For the second day on Tuesday, at least four marches were reported to take place. Many caused traffic gridlock and shut down major thoroughfares and bridges.
Michael West, 18, said that he was taking part to show respect to Brown’s family. “As a black male, I am protesting the recurrence of this incident in America,” he said. The family had organised a press conference on Tuesday where the family’s attorney said that the judicial “process was broken,” and that the victim’s family were to push for federal charges.
In an earlier statement released Monday night, Brown’s parents said that they were “profoundly disappointed that the killer of our child will not face the consequence of his actions.” They, however, urged calm and that protests proceed peacefully.
Chiefly non-violent, protesters tramped forcefully through New York’s streets, moving in between stationary cars and taxis, their chants growing louder as they marched on. They cried: “Black Lives Matter,” “No Justice, No Peace, No Racist Police,”and “Revolution, Revolution.” The most popular call-and-response - “Hands Up, Don't Shoot,” alluding to a variation of Brown's last words before being shot - was the mantra of the marches.
Moises Delgado, a Bronx resident of Puerto Rican descent, said that “anger [over the verdict] is not organised, but it is real, dynamic, and happening nationwide.” Delgado identifies with Brown’s case because southern Bronx, a New York’s borough where he lives, shares high poverty rates with Ferguson. South Bronx is the poorest district in the country, with 38 percent of its residents living below the poverty line, according to the 2010 US Census data.
“Whenever you have poverty, you have oppression,” Delgado adds.
According to the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based non-profit public policy organisation, poverty in Ferguson doubled between 2000 and 2010/2012. In 2012, roughly one in four residents suffered from poverty.
Nadia Kumar, a 23-year-old Palestinian-American pastry chef, similarly says that “blacks were never really free, just like Palestinians.”
As one march passed by the restaurant where he works, Morgan Graham, 32, bolted out to videotape it. “This sends a message to the world that we cannot tolerate totalitarianism,” he said. “We got our banks bailed out; we got into wars incited by our government; we are tired of this police-state.”
Short link: