# # #
5,000 March In Protest of Eric Garner’s Murder by NYPD (Video+Live NYT Blog Links)
Here's the link to the Live Blog from NY Times
Thousands gather in Staten Island for march against NYPD chokehold death; Rev. Al Sharpton calls for peaceful march
JONATHAN LEMIRE
By The Associated Press
August 23, 2014 11:56 AM
NEW YORK - (AP) -- The Rev. Al Sharpton urged marchers to remain nonviolent or go home Saturday ahead of a rally seeking justice in the death of an unarmed black man placed in a chokehold by a white police officer…
…
…An hour before the scheduled start of the rally, several thousand people had already gathered at the intersection where Garner died. Activists want criminal charges brought against the officers involved.
Many carried signs. Some said: "Police the NYPD" or "RIP Eric Garner." But the most popular signs were "Hands Up, Don't Shoot," which emerged during protests in Missouri over the police killing of Michael Brown, and "I can't breathe," Garner's last words, heard on a widely circulated video of the death.
The march comes five weeks after the death of Garner, a 43-year-old asthmatic father of six.
At the church, Garner's widow, Esaw, urged the crowd to march in peace toward justice.
Esaw Garner said she is too afraid to let her sons go outside and asked the rally to "get justice" for her husband…
# # #
New York rally for Eric Garner: 'We don’t want any more Michael Browns'
• Crowds gather in Staten Island near site of Eric Garner death
• Up to 15,000 people expected in call for fair policing
• Protesters echo Ferguson’s ‘Hands up, don’t shoot’
• Ferguson police officer relieved of duty over video
• Blame poverty not race, say Ferguson white minority
Joanna Walters in Staten Island, New York
theguardian.com
Saturday 23 August 2014 11.32 EDT
Thousands of people gathered in the New York borough of Staten Island on Saturday, to protest near the spot where Eric Garner, an unarmed 43-year-old black man, was killed last month after white police officers used an illegal chokehold while trying to subdue and arrest him.
As tensions continued to simmer in Ferguson, Missouri, over the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black 18-year-old, by a white police officer earlier this month, up to 15,000 people were initially forecast to march in New York and rally to support the dead men and call for justice and fair policing. On Saturday a marshal at the event told the Guardian between 5,000 and 7,000 marchers were expected.
Crowds packed on to the Staten Island ferry alongside bewildered tourists out to photograph the Statue of Liberty, as activists and ordinary citizens of all ages and skin colours, from New York and further afield, headed to the gathering point close to where Garner was killed in July.
Protesters shouted “Hands up, don’t shoot” as they gathered at the protest, echoing the chant that has taken hold in Ferguson – some witness accounts say Brown had his hands up when he was shot dead in disputed circumstances two weeks ago.
T-shirts read “Black man walking, don’t shoot”, “Black lives matter” and “I have a dream”, in reference to the most famous speech by the assassinated 1960s civil rights leader Martin Luther King…
# # #
If you get a chance, checkout my previous post, from early Saturday morning: WaPo: “For blacks, America is dangerous by default,” by Mariame Kaba. (It's one thing to attempt to understand white privilege from a white perspective; but, being white, and as far back as my adolescence, I've always known: "No matter how sincerely a white person tries to understand white privilege, they can only empathize, not sympathize.")
# # #