Alton Sterling fatally shot by Baton Rouge police
Two disturbing videos emerged this week showing the horrific death of a Louisiana man who was fatally shot at close range by police.
According to a statement published on the Baton Rouge Police Department’s Facebook page, a person called police just after midnight on Tuesday to report that a black man had threatened him with a gun. The man was described as wearing a red shirt and selling CDs outside a Triple S Food Mart. Two uniformed officers responded to the call and confronted the suspect, 37-year-old Alton Sterling, at the convenience store.
In a video taken from a nearby parked car, Sterling is seen being violently tackled and thrown to the pavement by an officer.
Another video, shot by the owner of the store, Abdullah Muflahi, shows Sterling pinned to the ground. One officer is straddling him, holding what appears to be a gun to his chest while warning him not to move. The other officer, who kneeling by Sterling’s head, pulls his gun out of its holster when Sterling continues to struggle.
One of the officers suddenly yells “Gun!”, and shots ring out as Sterling is hit repeatedly in the chest. He later died from his injuries.
An unnamed witness told Baton Rouge newspaper the Advocate that Sterling had a gun but was neither holding it nor touching his pockets during the altercation. Shop owner Muflahi told the Advocate that officers retrieved a gun from Sterling’s pocket after the incident.
The U.S. Justice Department opened a civil rights investigation into the shooting after protests in the community erupted immediately after the shooting. The two officers involved have been put on paid administrative leave, which is standard procedure after shooting incidents.