Demonstrators march downtown days after the fatal shooting of Amir Locke, 22.
Chanting the name of Amir Locke, a large crowd of protesters marched in frigid weather in downtown Minneapolis on Saturday to voice exasperation and anger over the conduct of law enforcement officers, nearly two years after the murder of George Floyd. Mr. Locke,22, was fatally shot in an early morning raid on Wednesday when a SWAT team for the Minneapolis Police Department carried out a search warrant for the police in nearby St. Paul involving a homicide. Mr. Locke was not named as a suspect in the warrant, according to authorities. Tensions over racial justice and police violence were already elevated in the Twin Cities before the death of Mr. Locke, who was Black. The federal trial against the three former Minneapolis police officers who stood by as Derek Chauvin, their superior officer, knelt on Mr. Floyd’s neck has been underway since Jan.24. A graphic and brief body camera video of the raid involving Mr. Locke released by the Minneapolis Police Department on Thursday night shows an officer quietly turning a key in the apartment door before officers enter the apartment and begin to shout. “Police! Search warrant!” they yell. One officer kicked the back of the couch, where Mr. Locke was huddled under a blanket, jarring Mr. Locke and making a gun visible. The police fired at least three times in response. Mr. Locke died of multiple gunshot wounds, according to a report from the Hennepin County Medical Examiner.
