Atlanta mayor calls for citizens to stop 'shooting each other' after murder of 8-year-old near BLM protest site
From WWW.FOXNEWS.COM
In an impassioned press conference Sunday night, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms issued a full-throated call for citizens to stop "shooting each other up on our streets," after an eight-year-old girl was shot and killed on the Fourth of July near a Wendy's that has become a flashpoint of anti-police Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests in the city.
Bottoms, considered a potential running mate for Joe Biden, made the remarks as she fought through tears -- and the nation endured a new bout of urban carnage. Sixty-three people were injured and 17 killed in Chicago, including two children, over the weekend; and in New York City, 44 were hurt and at least 6 killed.
“Enough is enough," Bottoms said. "Enough is enough. We have talked about this movement that's happening across America and this moment in time when we have the ears and the interests of people across this country and across this globe who are saying they want to see change. But the difference in this moment in time with the civil rights movement -- the civil rights movement, there was a defined, common enemy. We're fighting the enemy within when we are shooting each other up on our streets."
She continued: "You shot and killed a baby. And there wasn’t just one shooter; there were at least two shooters. An eight-year-old baby. If you want people to take us seriously, and you don't want us to lose this movement, then we can't lose each other."
"It has to stop," Bottoms added, according to FOX 5 Atlanta. "You can't blame this on police officers. It's about people who shot a baby in a car. We're doing each other more harm than any officer on this force."
Secoriya Williamson, the father of eight-year-old Secoriea Turner, told reporters that his daughter had been killed after at least two people in a crowd of armed people opened fire on a car she was riding in with her mother. Authorities said the mother had attempted to drive through illegally placed barricades in the area when the vehicle came under fire Saturday night.
Bottoms said there have been problems with protesters in the area putting up barriers to close off the street. She said she received a message that the barriers were back up less than an hour before she was informed that the eight-year-old girl had died.
"They say Black Lives Matter. You killed your own," Williamson said. "They killed my baby because she crossed a barrier and made a U-turn? You killed a child. She didn't do nothing to nobody. Black Lives Matter? You killing your own. You killed an eight-year-old child. She ain't did nothing to no one of y'all. She just wanted to get home to see her cousin. That's all she wanted to do."
The shooting happened near the Wendy’s restaurant where a black man, Rayshard Brooks, was killed by an Atlanta police officer on June 12. Brooks was shot only after he was caught on tape beating two officers, stealing a taser from one, and then turning and shooting the taser at an officer. The officer who shot Brooks is now fighting charges that could bring the death penalty, and the officer's stepmother was fired from her job. (She told Fox News she was "stunned" by her termination and the charges against her son.)
The fast-food outlet was later burned, and the area has since become a site for frequent demonstrations against alleged police brutality.
In a statement Sunday, police said the girl was in a car with her mother and a friend of the mother when they got off Interstate-75/85 onto University Avenue and were trying to enter a parking lot nearby. They ran into a group of armed individuals who had blocked the entrance.
“At some point, someone in that group opened fire on the vehicle, striking it multiple times and striking the child who was inside,” the statement read. The driver drove the girl to Atlanta Medical Center but she did not su... (Read more)
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