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Police shootings
From 2015 to 2022
In 2014, Michael Brown, a black teenager, was fatally shot by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri. This incident led to harsh criticism of police officer training and tactics.
The Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, a group with chapters in many cities that works to stop police brutality, put out a study the year before Michael Brown was killed that said, “Police officers, security guards, or self-appointed vigilantes killed at least 312 African-Americans in 2012.”
The study’s conclusion created mass hysteria in black communities by stating: A black person was killed by police officers or security forces every 28 hours.
Michael Brown’s shooting confirmed the hysteria. Rioting erupted in Ferguson, and there were nationwide protests condemning the police. But a narrative ensued that grossly overestimated the number of black people killed by police officers. It was widely believed that police officers shot hundreds of unarmed black people per year.
Those that were skeptical of the “police killing spree” narrative insisted the biggest problem inside inner-city neighborhoods was black-on-black homicides. Black activists, however, scolded the skeptics and told them that “black-on-black” crime was either a myth or a misnomer that diverted attention from trigger-happy racist cops…