Two dead in Kenosha on third night of unrest after Jacob Blake shooting | US news
Two people were shot dead and another injured when at least one gunman opened fire on protesters in Kenosha, Wisconsin, amid demonstrations against the police shooting of Jacob Blake three days ago.
David Beth, the county sheriff, said one person was shot in the head and another in the chest just before midnight on Tuesday. Another was shot in the arm.
Beth said people describing themselves as belonging to a militia had been patrolling Kenosha’s streets in recent nights but he did not know if the shooter was involved with such a group. “They’re a militia,” Beth told reporters. “They’re like a vigilante group.”
Video posted on social media showed chaotic scenes as gunfire rang out, scattering people in the street. One of the victims, a young shirtless white man with a red bandana around his neck, was seen receiving first aid in a car park after apparently being shot in the head.
In an other image, a man sits on the ground with his arm almost severed by a gunshot wound.
The third night of protests against against the police shooting of Blake, who was hit at almost point-blank range multiple times in the back, had attracted supporters of Black Lives Matter and armed rival protesters who had gathered near a petrol station.
Images of the rival group showed heavily armed white men, some wearing body armour.
According to witness reports, the two groups had increasingly come into conflict as the night wore on, and police fired teargas and rubber bullets at demonstrators near Kenosha’s court house.
Beth said the initial investigation into the shooting was focused on the group of men with guns outside the petrol station.
Commenting on calls to deputise citizens to help police the protests, Beth said: “I’ve had people saying, ‘Why don’t you deputise citizens? This is why you don’t deputise citizens with guns to protect Kenosha.”
The shootings came as hundreds of people again defied a curfew on Tuesday in Kenosha, where destruction marred protests the previous night as fires were set and businesses vandalised.
There were 34 fires associated with that unrest, with 30 businesses destroyed or damaged along with an unknown number of residences, the Kenosha fire chief, Charles Leipzig, told the Kenosha News.
According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the shootings took place in an area between 63rd Street and Sheridan Road, near the Froedtert South hospital.
A widely shared video shows a man in a grey jacket and black trousers and reversed baseball cap, with a bag slung over his shoulder, jogging north along Sheridan Road with an assault-style rifle while being followed by protesters. Seconds later, gunshots are heard amid speculation that some of those following the man had been shot while trying to disarm him.
While police said they were looking for one individual with a “long gun”, footage appeared to reveal the sound of shots coming from more than one location with voices suggesting the shooter may have been in a vehicle.
Adding to the febrile atmosphere were some posts suggesting that rightwing militia members, or “boogaloo” types, had intended to confront the protests.
“I feel very confident we’ll have him in a very short time,” Beth said.
Kenosha has been rocked by protests since Sunday, when police shot Blake in the back as he walked away from two officers and opened his car door, according to a bystander video that went viral. Three of his young sons were in the vehicle, witnesses said.
Blake, 29, was left paralysed and “fighting for his life”, his family and lawyers said on Tuesday, hours before the latest round of civil unrest in the lakefront town.
The Wisconsin governor, Tony Evers, had called for calm on Tuesday, while also declaring a state of emergency under which he doubled the national guard deployment in Kenosha to 250.
The night before crowds destroyed dozens of buildings and set more than 30 fires downtown.
Blake’s mother, Julia Jackson, said the damage in Kenosha did not reflect what her family wanted and if her son could see it he would be unhappy.
She said the first thing her son said to her when she saw him was he was sorry.
“He said, ‘I don’t want to be a burden on you guys’,” Jackson said. “‘I want to be with my children, and I don’t think I’ll walk again’.”
Three of Blake’s sons aged three, five and eight were in the car at the time of the shooting, Crump said. It was the eight-year-old’s birthday, he added.
The man who said he made the video of the shooting, 22-year-old Raysean White, said he saw Blake scuffling with three officers and heard them yell, ‘Drop the knife! Drop the knife!’ before the gunfire erupted. He said he did not see a knife in Blake’s hands.
In the footage, Blake walks from the pavement around the front of his SUV to his driver-side door as officers follow him with their guns drawn, shouting at him.
As Blake opens the door and leans into the vehicle, an officer grabs his shirt from behind and opens fire. Seven shots can be heard, though it is not clear how many struck Blake or how many officers fired.
Blake’s father told the Chicago Sun-Times his son had eight holes in his body.
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