This past Wednesday night, a 26-year-old black man identified as Justin Carr was shot outside the Omni Hotel during protests in Charlotte, North Carolina. Carr died on Thursday.
The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department initially claimed that Carr was fatally shot by another protester before going back on those claims because protesters insisted that Carr was shot with rubber bullets by riot police. The Police Department also initially claimed that Carr died Wednesday when he was actually in critical condition and on life support.
Supposedly the police department was looking into whether it had really been the police who had killed Carr, but announced Friday afternoon that Rayquan Borum, 21, has been charged with Carr’s murder. This is controversial because many believe that the true culprit was someone from the riot police.
Jimmy James Tyson, a community activist, and first responder was 10 to 15 yards away from Carr when he was shot. Tyson was arrested last year with Bree Newsome for removing the Confederate flag from the South Carolina Statehouse.
About Carr's shooting, Tyson has said, "It’s important to say here that his feet were toward the Omni, head pointed away from the police as if he had been shot from that direction, the direction in which the rubber bullets came flying...The Fire Department came in riot gear. [They] failed to stabilize his neck or spine. They just carried him by hand...I know they arrested a man, but I believe that the city is lying. I believe that the riot police were lying because they know they shot him...I did not see any confrontation between protesters. All I saw were rubber bullets. I would testify in a court of law to what I believe to be the truth.”
While the government and the police try to convince us that it was a violent protester who killed Justin Carr, who was peacefully protesting that Wednesday night, it seems that the account they're trying to sell the public isn't what truly happened. However, it also seems that even if that were true, no true justice will be exacted for Justin Carr, and a man innocent of this crime may go to jail. Not that it would be the first time something like that happened in this country, nor will it be the last most likely. It seems that no matter how black people go about trying to make sure they get equality and their deserved respect, everyone else will make it as difficult for them as possible.
Hopefully, this spiral in history will become linear at some point because it's long overdue for all the violence and inequality to have ended.
