The shooting death of nineteen-year-old Timothy DeWayne Thomas, Jr. by Cincinnati, Ohio Police Department Patrolmen Stephen Roach during an attempted arrest for non-violent misdemeanors in April 2001, focused national attention on the deaths of unarmed black men and women at the hands of police and security guards. Thomas’s death … Read MoreTimothy DeWayne Thomas, Jr. (1981-2001)
Image Ownership: Public domain The shooting death of Walter Lamar Scott, an unarmed black man, by Michael Thomas Slager, a white police officer, during a daytime traffic stop, helped fuel the Black Lives Matter movement. Many people viewed the shooting as racially motivated, and the … Read MoreWalter Lamar Scott (1965-2015)
Image Ownership: Public domain Twenty-three-year-old Sean Elijah Bell, the victim of a violent police shooting in 2006, was born on May 18, 1983, to William and Valerie Bell. As a child, Bell was interested in acting and played baseball. According to Bell’s fiancée, Nicole Poultre, … Read MoreSean Elijah Bell (1983-2006)
Abner Louima, an activist against police brutality, is unfortunately best known for being brutalized, sexually assaulted, and savagely beaten by New York Police Department officers in 1997. Louima was born in 1966 in Thomassin, Haiti, the oldest of his parents’ four children. His father worked … Read MoreAbner Louima (1966- )
Image Ownership: Public domain Lamar Smith, a voting rights activist and veteran, was a martyr in the fight for civil rights. Smith was born in March 1892 to Levi Smith and Harriet Humphrey in Lincoln County, Mississippi; however, there is little information concerning his early … Read MoreLamar Smith (1892-1955)
Amadou Diallo was a Guinean immigrant who lived in Manhattan, New York, and is unfortunately best known for being killed by New York City police after he was fired upon forty-one times outside his place of residence. Diallo was born on September 2, 1976, in … Read MoreAmadou Diallo (1976–1999)
On July 12, 2013, 17 year-old Deion Fludd passed away as a result of complications from blunt-trauma injuries after being attacked by New York Police Department (NYPD) officers. Raised in the Red Hooks projects of Brooklyn, New York, Deion was the middle child of five. His parents were Karen … Read MoreDeion Fludd (1996-2013)
Death to the Klan Poster “Image Ownership: Public Domain” On November 3, 1979, in Greensboro, North Carolina, a “Death to the Klan” rally and march organized by the Communist Workers Party which was previously known as the Workers Viewpoint Organization (WVO), was planned to occur … Read MoreGreensboro Massacre (1979)
The death of Freddie Gray in 2015 while in police custody brought increased attention to the national debate on interactions between law enforcement and African Americans and inspired the ongoing Black Lives Matter movement. Freddie Gray Jr. was born on August 16, 1989, in Baltimore, … Read MoreFreddie Gray Jr. (1989-2015)
“Image Ownership: Public Domain” The shooting death of twelve-year-old Tamir Rice in 2014 brought increased attention to the national debate on interactions between police officers and African Americans. Tamir Elijah Rice was born to Samaria Rice and Leonard Warner on June 15, 2002, in Cleveland, … Read MoreTamir Elijah Rice (2002–2014)