Viral video showed an unidentified driver speeding through a Black Lives Matter protest Saturday after demonstrators took to Colorado streets to demand justice for Elijah McClain, a Black man who died after a Colorado cop put him in a chokehold. The protest was held in the Denver suburb of Aurora, where McClain died, according to the Sentinel Colorado.
Natalie Ledesma, a protester at the demonstration, told the newspaper another driver in a white truck blocked the Jeep’s path, crashed into it, and prevented it from injuring anyone. Witnesses said another protester appeared to aim a gun at the Jeep but instead hit another demonstrator in the leg.
The injured person was taken to the hospital in stable condition, ABC Denver reported. And even though video captured the scene of protesters hurriedly trying to escape the Jeep’s path, it’s not the SUV’s driver who commanded the harshest criticism from authorities. It’s protesters following reports of broken windows and a fire at the Aurora Municipal Center. Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman called those accused of damaging the building "domestic terrorists" in a later amended statement ABC Denver obtained Sunday.
In his original statement, Coffman wrote:
“This morning I went over to the Aurora municipal complex to survey the damage from last nights violence. From the report that I received late last night, approximately 600 individuals attended the protest was over about 150 stayed behind. Those who remained sought to bait the police into a confrontation and to destroy as much public property as possible. The focus of their main effort was on the destruction of our court house. Where they managed to tear down the plywood protecting the large glass windows and smashed through all but one on the south side of the building. Make no mistake about it, the one who remained behind were not protesters but domestic terrorists and they must be treated as scuh. I understand the out police department chose to show restraint last night by not using nonlethal munitions but now that these terrorists smell weakness, my concern is that they will be back again and again until they achieve their goal."
Coffman later tweeted a version of the statement that didn’t dub protesters “domestic terrorists,” but he didn’t make mention of the driver accused of trying to run down protesters in either statement. "Tomorrow, I will request a briefing on the incident by the interim Chief of Police to myself and the members of our city council and I will be asking why our court house was not adequately defended," he said. He also tweeted: #Aurora cannot become #Portland #OneAurora”
The Republican mayor, however, made no mention of the man many of the protesters were marching for—Elijah McClain. He was dancing on his walk home from a local store when police responding to a "suspicious person" call stopped him, engaged him in a struggle, and ultimately put him in a chokehold that ended with his death. The incident Aug. 24, 2019 went viral when police released body camera video that showed McClain telling officers he was trying to turn his music off so that he could hear them, but that didn’t stop officers from wrestling with him and officer Nathan Woodyard from putting him in the chokehold, which caused McClain to lose consciousness, CNN reported.
District Attorney Dave Young, who chose not to charge officers who detained McClain, said in a statement last month that “the pathologist who conducted the autopsy stated that he was unable to conclude that the actions of any law enforcement officer caused Mr. McClain’s death.”
"Based on the facts and evidence of this investigation I cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the officers involved in this incident were not justified in their actions based on what they knew at the time of this incident," Young said in the statement CBS Denver obtained.
McClain's detainment has been compared to and deemed far less humane than that of James Eagan Holmes, a white man arrested in Aurora for killing a dozen people at a midnight premiere of the Batman movie, “The Dark Knight Rises” July 20, 2012.
"Look at James Holmes, a white man who was a mass murderer, was able to be arrested without incident," media studies professor Marc Lamont Hill told ABC News. "Somehow, when it comes to white suspects, police managed to locate a level of discipline and care and patience that they don't for Black suspects, even ones who were unarmed."
Janice Rowe, a protester and military veteran, told the Sentinel Colorado, that as a Black woman she lives in fear of police. "No one should have to live in fear for their life,” she said.
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