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African-Americans & the Black Experience: Black Lives Matter

Police brutality refers to excessive, unjustified, or undue use of force. Recent surveys indicate that most people agree with police officials that brutality is not a widespread problem but is instead limited to a few “bad apples.”

What is "Black Lives Matter (BLM) is an international activist movement, originating in the African-American community, that campaigns against violence and systemic racism toward black people. 

The Black Lives Matter Mission - (BLM) activists seek to draw attention to the many ways in which Black people are treated unfairly in society and the ways in which institutions, laws, and policies help to perpetuate that unfairness.

Excessive Force

  • Rodney King - In May 1991, King failed to yield to Los Angeles police (because, he later said, that he feared a traffic violation might result in revocation of his parole) and was chased by the Los Angeles police and the California Highway Patrol. When his car was finally stopped, several white officers began to “beat him to death,” in the words of one of the officers.
  • George Floyd -On May 25, 2020, George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man was killed in Minneapolis, Minnesota after he was arrested for allegedly trying to use counterfeit currency. He was killed by a white police officer who kneeled on his neck for nearly nine minutes. 
  • Eric Garner - On July 17, 2014, A US citizen was killed when being physically restrained by NYPD officers. This sparked nationwide protests after a grand jury decided not to indict the men concerned. During the altercation, Garner pleaded with the officers "I can’t breathe."
  • Michael Brown - On August 9, 2014, Michael Brown, an 18-year-old African-American teenager, was murdered in the Canfield Green Apartment complex by Officer Darren Wilson, a member of the Saint Louis County Police. see also -  Ferguson Riots 
  • Tamir Rice - Tamir Rice was an innocent 12-year-old child who was killed on November 22, 2014, by a white police officer in Cleveland, Ohio. Two officers responded to a police dispatch call reporting that there was a male pointing a pistol at random people in the park. 
  • Breonna Taylor -On March 13, 2020, a Black medical worker who was shot and killed by Louisville police officers in March during a botched raid on her apartment.
  • Jamel Floyd - On June 3, 2020,  Floyd, 35, died in custody at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn after being pepper-sprayed by staff, according to a news release from the federal Bureau of Prisons.

Newsweek -  Full list of 229 Black People killed by police since George Floyd's murder - Published May 25, 2021 

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