Cop cleared in shooting of black man
Wisconsin prosecutors have cleared a white police officer of criminal charges in the shooting of a black man in the presence of his young children, leaving him paralysed and triggering deadly protests that inflamed US racial tensions.
Kenosha County District Attorney Michael Graveley found officer Rusten Sheskey acted in self-defence while responding to a domestic dispute last Aug 23. He shot Jacob Blake seven times at close range, saying he was armed with a knife, had resisted arrest and withstood multiple Taser shots.
The decision against prosecuting Mr Sheskey or the two other officers on the scene could incite more demonstrations, which have frequently broken out in the United States in recent years after police have been cleared of wrongdoing in the shootings of African Americans.
Calm remained after dark as about 50 people braved sub-freezing temperatures and marched through streets where storefronts had been boarded up in anticipation of unrest.
“This is an expression of our deep suffering,” said Caliph Muab’El, a black minister, as he rode along in a car behind the marchers. “I wasn’t surprised by the decision. It’s a perpetuation of the same old, same old that we see in this country.”
Kenosha, a city of 100,000 people between Milwaukee and Chicago, had braced for the decision and Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers authorised the Wisconsin National Guard to support local law enforcement.
Protests broke out last summer in response to a viral cellphone video that showed Mr Blake walking around the front of his car with Mr Sheskey following and opening fire after Mr Blake opened the door.
But investigators said the video was incomplete, failing to reveal that Mr Blake was armed with a knife and that he had resisted arrest when police tried to detain him on a felony arrest warrant.
Mr Blake refused police commands to drop the knife, which Mr Graveley said gave Mr Sheskey the right to self-defence. As Mr Sheskey made a final attempt to detain him, Mr Blake turned and thrust the knife towards the officer, an act blocked on the video by the car door and another officer, investigators said.
B’Ivory LaMarr, one of the lawyers for the Blake family, said Mr Sheskey should have been charged with attempted homicide and called on people to advocate for racial justice and police reform.
“The video made it clear that Jacob ... never raised a knife,” Mr LaMarr said.
Mr Blake’s shooting attracted a mix of civil rights demonstrators, anarchists and right-wing militias to Kenosha last summer.
At the height of those protests, teenager Kyle Rittenhouse opened fire with a Smith & Wesson M&P 15 rifle, killing two men and wounding another. Now 18, Mr Rittenhouse, was charged with first-degree reckless homicide and five other criminal counts.
Earlier on Tuesday, Mr Rittenhouse pleaded not guilty to all counts in an appearance by video at Kenosha County Circuit Court.