Protests have erupted in Minneapolis after witnesses claim a police officer shot an unarmed black man ‘in the head execution style’ while he was already in handcuffs early Sunday morning.
The Minneapolis NAACP said family members and witnesses identified the man as Jamar Clark and said he was hospitalized following the shooting and is on life support.
Police said they were called to a north Minneapolis home at about 12:45am for a report of an assault and that they found the man interfering with paramedics who were assisting the victim.
Officers tried to calm the man when an altercation erupted. At some point an officer fired his weapon and the man was struck.
One family member told The Minneapolis Tribune that Clark has been declared brain dead.
Police Chief Janee Harteau said the preliminary investigation shows the man was not handcuffed.
Bureau of Criminal Apprehension superintendent Drew Evans said there were handcuffs at the scene, but added that authorities are working to determine the exact situation when the man was shot.
Nekelia Sharp, who lives across the street, said the man trying to talk to his girlfriend after their argument when he was handcuffed and then shot, she told the paper.
Witness Teto Wilson saw Clark ‘just laying there’ and was not resisting arrest when he was shot, according to an NAACP statement on the incident.
‘Two officers were surrounding the victim on the ground, an officer maneuvered his body to shield Jamar’s body, and I heard the shot go off,’ Wilson said.
Another woman who lived across the street from the shooting said she ran over seconds after she heard the shot.
‘All the witnesses were yelling they shot the man while he was already down and handcuffed,’ Lisa Neal-Delgado wrote in a Facebook post.
Neal-Delgado said the man was shot in front of ‘dozens on witnesses’ who police then began ‘manhandling’ after the shooting.
Some witnesses said police used pepper-spray on several people in the crowd and tried to push the large crowd back in what became an increasingly chaotic scene.
Jason Sole, chair of the Minneapolis NAACP’s criminal justice committee, said many black residents of north Minneapolis are upset.
‘We have been saying for a significant amount of time that Minneapolis is one bullet away from Ferguson,’ he said.
‘That bullet was fired last night. We want justice immediately.’
Protesters organized by the group Black Lives Matter Minneapolis marched through the streets for a rally on Sunday, beating drums and carrying banners.
About 250 people began at the scene of the shooting before the group arrived at the police department’s Fourth Precinct headquarters, where they banged on the doors and demanded to be allowed inside.
Raeisha Williams with the Minneapolis NAACP told the Associated Press that protesters plan to stay at the precinct until the names of the officers involved are released.
Black Lives Matter Minneapolis is also demanding police release video footage documenting the shooting, which they say police took from the Elks Lodge community center across the street.
Two officers are on paid administrative leave, which is standard practice after such an incident, according to Fox 9.
Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges and police Chief Janee Harteau held a listening session with the community Sunday evening.
Harteau revealed she had asked the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension to conduct an independent investigation before adding that there is a lot ‘of speculation out there’ regarding how the shooting unfolded.
‘We need to know exactly what happened, we need to know the truth,’ she said.
‘Everyone involved needs that and deserves that.’
