Tag Archives: Charlotte

Lockdown lifted at North Carolina university after shooter kills two, wounds four

Trystan Andrew Terrell in a booking photo released by the Mecklenburg County Sheriff's Office. REUTERS/MCSO/Handout

By Greg Lacour

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (Reuters) – The University of North Carolina at Charlotte lifted a campus lockdown on Wednesday morning, a day after a gunman killed two people and wounded four on the school’s last day of classes for the semester.

Police in Charlotte charged UNC Charlotte student Trystan Andrew Terrell, 22, with two counts of murder and four of attempted murder. Three of the four people he wounded were in a critical condition on Wednesday.

They offered no hints as to the suspect’s motive and did not identify the victims.

Students on the campus spent a harrowing night as police searched door-to-door for any other suspects, not giving people the all-clear to move around till almost dawn.

“This is the saddest day in UNC Charlotte’s history,” the school’s chancellor, Phil Dubois, said in a letter to the community posted on the school’s website. “Families of the deceased victims are being notified and university staff are with those who are injured.”

The shooting started at about 5:40 p.m. on Tuesday police said, in a classroom. Tristan Field, a student who witnessed the shooting, told CBS News as many as 50 students tried to escape through two doors.

“A chair fell in front of the door, so people were tripping over that, like, trying to climb over it,” he said. “Some people fell down. It was like water through a funnel but wasn’t fast enough.”

The gunman was disarmed by two or three campus police officers who entered the building after responding to an emergency call, campus Police Chief Jeff Baker said.

A vigil was planned at the school for Wednesday, CBS news reported.

Sandy D’Elousa, a spokeswoman for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department, which is leading the investigation, said the gunman was believed to have acted alone.

North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper called the incident a tragic day for the university and the state just a few days before graduation. “But I know the people in this community, and they will be here for each other,” he said at a news conference.

According to its website, the University of North Carolina at Charlotte has more than 26,500 students.

The deadliest mass shooting on a higher education campus in the United States took place at Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg, Virginia, in April 2007, when a student killed 32 people and then himself.

(Reporting by Greg Lacour in Charlotte; Additional reporting by Gabriella Borter in New York and Rich McKay in Atlanta; Editing by Scott Malone and Bill Trott)

North Carolina police officer justified in black man’s shooting

Keith Scott looks over to police with hands by his sides just before he was shot four times by Charlotte police in Charlotte, North Carolina,

By Greg Lacour

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (Reuters) – The police officer who shot and killed a black man in Charlotte, North Carolina, in September “acted lawfully” and will not be charged for his use of force, the local district attorney said on Wednesday.

Officer Brentley Vinson reasonably believed he and fellow officers faced an imminent threat from Keith Scott, 43, who was armed with a cocked and loaded gun when they confronted him in the parking lot of a Charlotte apartment complex, District Attorney Andrew Murray told a news conference.

“Officers can be heard at least 10 times ordering Mr. Scott to drop the gun,” Murray said. “Mr. Scott did not comply with those commands.”

Scott’s family has denied he had a weapon during the Sept. 20 incident, which sparked a week of sometimes violent protests in Charlotte, North Carolina’s largest city and a U.S. banking hub.

But Murray said “all of the credible and available evidence suggests that he was, in fact, armed.”

The shooting made Charlotte another flashpoint in two years of protests over police killings of black men, many of them unarmed, across the country.

A day after Scott was killed, demonstrators took to the streets in the upscale urban area known as “Uptown,” where some looted businesses, smashed windows and blocked traffic.

Dozens of people were arrested, and a man was fatally shot amid the chaos.

(Additional reporting and writing by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Peaceful protest in Charlotte as police chose not to enforce curfew

Protesters walk in the streets downtown during another night of protests over the police shooting of Keith Scott in Charlotte

By Andy Sullivan and Robert MacMillan

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (Reuters) – Largely peaceful protests dwindled early on Friday in Charlotte, North Carolina, as police chose not to enforce a curfew prompted by two nights of riots after a black man was shot to death by a police officer.

A crowd of hundreds gathered, chanted and marched for a third successive night in the city of about 810,000 people, demanding justice for Keith Scott, 43, who was shot dead by a black police officer in the parking lot of an apartment complex on Tuesday afternoon.

Scott’s death is the latest to stir passions in the United States over the police use of force against black men. It has stirred broad debate on race and justice in the United States and given rise to the Black Lives Matter movement.

He was the 214th black person killed by U.S. police this year out of an overall total of 821, according to Mapping Police Violence, another group created out of the protest movement. There is no national-level government data on police shootings.

A U.S. Congressman from North Carolina scrambled to apologize after telling the BBC in a broadcast interview that he believed that the protesters were motivated by jealousy.

“They hate white people because white people are successful and they’re not,” Robert Pittenger said in a televised interview late Thursday.

He later apologized on Twitter, saying, “What is taking place in my hometown breaks my heart. Today, my anguish led me to respond to a reporter’s question in a way that I regret.”

The Charlotte Police Department said on Twitter that two officers were treated after they were sprayed with a chemical agent by demonstrators and that no civilians were injured on Thursday.

Despite the brief outbursts, Thursday night’s demonstrations were calmer than those on the previous two nights in North Carolina’s largest city. Rioters had smashed storefront windows, looted businesses and thrown objects at police, prompting officials to declare a state of emergency and a curfew.

A protester who was shot on Wednesday died on Thursday. Nine people were injured and 44 were arrested in riots on Wednesday and Thursday morning.

Scott’s family viewed videos of the episode on Thursday and asked for them to be made public, stepping up the pressure on authorities.

In an interview with Reuters early Friday, Justin Bamberg, one of the lawyers who is representing Scott’s family, said the video shows that the 43-year-old did not make any aggressive moves towards police.

“There’s nothing in that video that shows him acting aggressively, threatening or maybe dangerous,” Bamberg said.

Scott, who suffered head trauma in a bad car accident a year ago, was moving slowly as he got out of the car, he said.

“He’s not an old man, but he’s moving like an old man” in the video, Bamberg said.

Earlier in the day, Bamberg said in a statement that it was “impossible to discern” from the videos what, if anything, Scott was holding in his hands.

Police say Scott was carrying a gun when he approached officers and ignored repeated orders to drop it. His family previously said he was holding a book, not a firearm, and now says it has more questions than answers after viewing two videos recorded by police body cameras.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Kerr Putney has said the video supported the police account of what happened but does not definitively show Scott pointing a gun at officers.

In contrast to the tension in Charlotte, the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma, was calm after a white police officer was charged with first-degree manslaughter on Thursday for a fatal shooting also captured on video. Police released a video of an unarmed black man, Terence Crutcher, being shot by the officer after his vehicle broke down on a highway.

(Additional reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Writing by Scott Malone; editing by Grant McCool)

Charlotte, N.C. in state of emergency after second night of violence

People running from flash bang grenades at Charlotte riot

By Greg Lacour and Andy Sullivan

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (Reuters) – Residents of Charlotte, North Carolina, woke to a state of emergency on Thursday with National Guard troops deployed on the streets after a second night of violent protests over the fatal police shooting of a black man.

One person was on life support after being shot by a civilian late Wednesday as riot police used tear gas, rubber bullets and flash-bang grenades to try to disperse demonstrators who looted stores and threw rocks, bottles and fireworks.

Four police officers suffered non-life threatening injuries, city officials said.

The latest trouble erupted after a peaceful rally earlier in the evening by protesters who reject the official account of how Keith Scott, 43, was gunned down by a black police officer in the parking lot of an apartment complex on Tuesday afternoon.

Authorities say Scott was wielding a handgun and was shot after refusing commands to drop it. His family and a witness say he was holding a book, not a firearm, when he was killed.

A spokesman for the Charlotte Fraternal Order of Police told CNN on Thursday he had seen video from the scene showing Scott holding a gun.

Scott’s wife, Rakeyia Scott, said on Wednesday evening that her family was “devastated” and had “more questions than answers” about her husband’s death.

She said she respected the rights of those who wanted to demonstrate, and asked that they do so peacefully.

But the pleas appeared to go mostly unheeded. Overnight, protesters smashed windows and glass doors at a downtown Hyatt hotel and punched two employees, the hotel’s manager told Reuters. The slogan “Black Lives Matter” was spray-painted on windows.

Looters were seen smashing windows and grabbed items from a convenience store as well as a shop that sells athletic wear for the National Basketball Association’s Charlotte Hornets. Protesters also set fire to trash cans.

It was the second night of unrest in North Carolina’s largest city and one of the biggest U.S. financial centers. Sixteen police officers and several protesters were injured on Tuesday night and in the early hours of Wednesday.

‘VIOLENCE NOT TOLERATED’

Governor Pat McCrory declared a state of emergency late Wednesday night and began the process of deploying the National Guard and state highway patrol officers to the city to help restore peace.

“Any violence directed toward our citizens or police officers or destruction of property should not be tolerated,” McCrory said in a statement.

Charlotte Mayor Jennifer Roberts was considering a curfew and Bank of America Corp <BAC.N>, which is headquartered in Charlotte, told employees not to report to work at its uptown offices, local media reported.

The American Civil Liberties Union has called on the police in Charlotte to release camera footage of the incident. Authorities have said the officer who shot Scott, Brentley Vinson, was in plainclothes and not wearing a body camera. But according to officials, video was recorded by other officers and by cameras mounted on patrol cars.

Todd Walther, the Charlotte Fraternal Order of Police official, said the plainclothes officers were wearing vests marked “police” and that he saw them do nothing wrong. Releasing the video would satisfy some people, but not everyone, he added, and people will have to wait for the investigation to conclude.

“The clear facts will come out and the truth will come out. It’s unfortunate to say that we have to be patient, but that’s the way it’s going to have to be,” Walter said.Mayor Roberts said she planned to view the footage on Thursday, but did not indicate if or when it would be made public.

The killing of Scott came just days after a fatal shooting of an unarmed black man in Tulsa, Oklahoma that was recorded on video. Protesters have held peaceful rallies demanding the arrest of the female officer involved.

U.S. President Barack Obama spoke by telephone on Wednesday with the mayors of Charlotte and Tulsa, a White House official said.

The two deaths were the latest in a series of police shootings over the last couple of years that have raised questions about racial bias in U.S. law enforcement. They have also made policing and community relations a major topic ahead of the presidential election in November.

William Barber, president of North Carolina’s chapter of the NAACP, called for the “full release of all facts available,” and said NAACP officials planned to meet with city officials and members of Scott’s family on Thursday.

(Additional reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Jeremy Gaunt and Jeffrey Benkoe)

Protest erupts after police kill black man in North Carolina

Protesters in Charlotte over the death of a black man

By Greg Lacour

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (Reuters) – Protesters blocked a highway and clashed with police in Charlotte, North Carolina, early on Wednesday morning after officers fatally shot a black man they said had a gun when they approached him in a parking lot.

About a dozen officers and several protesters suffered non-life threatening injuries during an hours-long demonstration near where Keith Lamont Scott, 43, was shot by a policeman on Tuesday afternoon, police and local media said on social media.

Early Wednesday morning, protesters blocked Interstate 85, where they stole boxes from trucks and started fires before police used flash grenades in an attempt to disperse the angry crowd, an ABC affiliate in Charlotte reported.

A group of protesters then tried to break into a Walmart store before police arrived and began guarding its front entryway, video footage by local media showed.

Earlier in the evening, police in riot gear reportedly used tear gas on protesters who threw rocks and water bottles at them as they wielded large sticks and blocked traffic. One officer was sent to the hospital after being struck in the head by a rock, police said.

Charlotte Mayor Jennifer Roberts urged for calm.

“The community deserves answers and (a) full investigation will ensue,” she said on Twitter, adding in a subsequent post, “I want answers too.”

Scott was shot by officer Brentley Vinson earlier in the day, according to Charlotte-Mecklenburg police. The shooting occurred when officers were at an apartment complex searching for a suspect with an outstanding warrant and they saw Scott get out of his vehicle with a firearm, the department said.

Vinson fired his weapon and struck Scott, who “posed an imminent deadly threat to the officers,” the department said in a statement.

Vinson, who joined the Charlotte police force in July 2014, is black, according to the department. He has been placed on paid administrative leave.

NATIONAL DEBATE

The fatal shooting came amid an intense national debate over the use of deadly force by police, particularly against black men.

Police did not immediately say if Scott was the suspect they had originally sought at the apartment complex. WSOC-TV, a local television station, reported that he was not.

Detectives recovered the gun Scott was holding at the time of the shooting and were interviewing witnesses, police said.

Protesters and Scott’s family disputed that the dead man was armed. Some family members told reporters that Scott had been holding a book and was waiting for his son to be dropped off from school.

Shakeala Baker, who lives in a neighboring apartment complex, said she had seen Scott in the parking lot on previous afternoons waiting for his child. But on Tuesday, she watched as medics tended to Scott after he was shot, she said.

“This is just sad,” said Baker, 31. “I get tired of seeing another black person shot every time I turn on the television. But (police are) scared for their own lives. So if they’re scared for their lives, how are they going to protect us?”

About 200 people gathered earlier Tuesday night for a peaceful protest in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where a white officer killed an unarmed black man last week in an incident captured on police videos.

Lawyers for the family of Terence Crutcher, 40, disputed that he posed any threat before he was shot by Tulsa Officer Betty Shelby after his sport utility vehicle broke down on Friday.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Tom Heneghan)