Ferguson to mark anniversary of shooting
Print Edition
Marches, prayers and a moment of silence were planned yesterday in Ferguson, Missouri, to mark a year since an unarmed black teenager was shot dead by a white police officer, sparking protests and a national debate on race and justice.
The shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown on August 9, 2014, thrust the mostly black suburb of St Louis in the United States into the national spotlight and sparked months of protests, including incidents of rioting and arson. It also gave life to a new movement under the “Black Lives Matter” banner, and spawned demonstrators determined to push for better treatment of minorities.
A makeshift memorial of teddy bears, candles and flowers has been rebuilt on the quiet residential road where Brown died, months after local officials removed a similar pile of offerings. A plaque featuring a metallic dove has also been installed on the sidewalk.
The organizers of yesterday’s events said their aim was to keep alive a movement fueled by the police killing of Brown and other unarmed black men across the United States.
For Brown’s father, also Michael Brown, the past year has brought a painful reckoning as well as an evolution to activism that leaves him still angry, but also optimistic that perhaps his son did not die in vain.
“I hurt every day, but I’m trying to make it uncomfortable to people that think this is OK to do this stuff. It might help other families out,” he said.
Brown yesterday asked for protesters to observe four and a half minutes’ silence starting at 11:55am to represent the roughly four and a half hours his son’s body lay dead in the street after he was shot.
Brown plans to follow that with a silent march aimed at honoring not just his son but others who have died at the hands of police.
A federal review found that the officer, Darren Wilson, broke no laws when he shot Brown, but it also determined that the Ferguson police department for years had violated the rights of the city’s black population.
Yvette Harris founded the St Louis-area nonprofit Mothers Against Senseless Killings after her 17-year-old son died in 2001 in a gang-related shooting. She said Brown’s death at the hands of a police officer sparked so much outrage because it was seen as just one in a long line of killings.
“There are so many killings going on around the country. People are mad, here and everywhere,” said Harris, who is black.
“It will be a long time before there is a healing,” she said.
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