Protesters gathered for a second night in Los Angeles over the deadly police shooting of an 18-year-old black man.
Demonstrators blocked an intersection Sunday night near the home of Carnell Snell Jr. The rowdy crowd included at least three car drivers doing donuts on the street and several others spray painting graffiti as officers stood by.
The Los Angeles Times reported that the crowd dwindled as the night wore on and police in riot gear eventually swarmed to move about a dozen people away from the area. Police told the paper that four people were arrested.
There were small protests in the same area a night earlier and at the residence of Mayor Eric Garcetti.
In a statement, Garcetti urged everyone to wait for “the completion of a thorough and proper investigation.”
Earlier Sunday, activists called on Los Angeles police to publicly name the officers involved in the shooting, which occurred near Snell’s home. They also appealed for a quick and transparent investigation.
“We don’t want to see a cover-up. We don’t want to see a whitewash,” Earl Ofari Hutchinson of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable said after meeting with the Snell’s family. “We have a family that’s grieving. We have a community that’s grieving.”
The shooting occurred Saturday afternoon. Los Angeles police say they tried to pull over a car with paper license plates at about 1 p.m. After a short chase the driver and a passenger got out and fled. The passenger ran in back of a house, where he was shot. The driver escaped.
The coroner’s office confirmed Sunday that Snell was the man killed. His family lives in another house in the front of the property where the shooting occurred. A back gate there was riddled with six bullet holes.
Police have disclosed little about their investigation other than to say a handgun was found at the scene. It was not clear if Snell was carrying it.
In a statement, the LAPD said investigators will gather evidence related to the shooting to determine whether deadly force was necessary and the district attorney’s office will review it to see if any criminal charges are warranted.
Snell was the third black man in five days to die in confrontations with police in Southern California. Last Tuesday, Alfred Olango was fatally shot by an officer in the San Diego suburb of El Cajon, triggering three days of angry and sometimes violent protests. Olango was shot when he took a “shooting stance” and pointed at an officer with what turned out to be a 4-inch vape pen — an electronic cigarette device.
On Friday, Reginald Thomas died after being shot with a Taser by police in Pasadena. He was armed with a knife and his wife described him as mentally ill. His brother told a 911 dispatcher that Thomas was high and had a history of violence.
In Snell’s South Los Angeles neighborhood of small stucco houses and well-kept lawns there was a makeshift shrine of flowers and candles in front of the property where he died.
Christine Conley, a next-door neighbor of Snell’s for 10 years, described the teenager she knew as “CJ” as cheerful and polite, someone who liked to dress nicely and didn’t sport gang clothing or tattoos.
She knew he had been in jail but didn’t know why. A Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department website indicated that Snell was arrested in January and released from jail on probation in June. It did not describe the nature of the offense.
“”He’s never given me any problems. He’s always been respectful and kind,” Conley said. “He was always happy.”
She said there is outrage in the black community “because of the way police handle our people.”
“If he was any other race than black, he may have had another chance,” she said.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
We have to wait for the facts to be known. That said, either there are more police killings than usual, or they are being more publicized.
As in Standing Rock, where are the dogs, security, armed police officers, Army Reserves, pepper spray, etc, etc, etc…..the media always jumps the gun without having all the info and want to report anything negative so they can make people perceive things as they want them to. Technology and social media are nice, but if used improperly or negatively, can cause a lot of problems and negative publicity.
Why did he run?? Do they ever think to just put up their hands and deal with it in the courts if feel like it was not a good stop?? No, because that would make sense!
Ann, once again your intelligence shows through.
They run because they are too frightened to stop. This violence of the police against black youth has been going on for a far longer time than we know about. It is only recently, and with the advent of social media, that these crimes are being publicized. If I were a black teenager and the police confronted me, I would run too. Run for my life, as they are doing.
I have a Mexican husband and for the 26 years we have been together, I have been lending him a certain respectability in the eyes of the police. He has never been pulled over while I, a white women of middle age at the beginning, and now old age, am in the car too. He had been pulled over in the past. BTW, we live in CA, in an area where I am a minority; however the police are predominantly white men.
Please stop sticking up for black street thugs i live in Chicago i’m white i have been robbed shot and stabbed by black thugs i also lived in a nieghborhood that was mostly white when we moved their and then turned Mexican i was beaten up by latin king street gangs as was my little brother why do people like you have to stick ip for people in the wrong you don’t run from police you don’t shoot at police if your against our system why dont you move to Mexico BLM is a racist organization they hate whites i am also a Viet Nam Veteran you people have tunnel vision wake up.
Why did they have to shoot to kill? I’ve always wondered why they don’t shoot a suspect in the leg if they’re chasing em, that would surely slow em down. Just wondering
Have you ever fired at moving target? It’s not like the movies where every bullet goes exactly where you want it to if you are the good guy and the bad guys always miss. Officers are trained to aim center mass of the target. That gives them the best chance of hitting the target and stopping the target. People saying they should aim for the legs or arms to wound and stop a target don’t know what they are talking about. Look at some fairly famous shoot outs. One that comes to my mind is a Marine in Iraq who was shot 10 -12 times and was still in the fight. There is a semi-famous photo of him being helped out of the building by a couple of Marine after the fight was over. There are lots of other examples.
If the guy is high they won’t feel anything and then they can sue the police department in civil court for shooting them.
Barack Obama’s race baiting is responsible for many of these deaths. He has everyone on the edge and suspicious of each other. Too many young blacks are buying into the narrative and police feel like a target has been hung on them. Whats happening was inevitable and intentional. But the real monster is Barack Obama and not the police.
I stand by the police and their decision to shoot these wannabe thugs. I also stand behind the good folks in this country for standing for their rights to run over BLM members when they stand in the middle of the street blocking good folks from WORKING and getting home. If I was their I would’ve gone around the block to get them again. The problem with this country is we have allowed these wannabe thugs to run over others rights, and of all of the apologist stupid white trash. When one of them rapes you don’t come crying to us. We are the silent majority who will be silent no more. We will take back our streets from these criminals. We will not apologize to this terrorist group. Please come down here to North West Florida and pull your crap. We are all heavily armed and we fully support our law enforcement agencies. Come here and let us show you how it’s done.