Second police-related shooting spurs further tension in Missouri suburb

As unrest and rioting take over Ferguson, Missouri the sight of yet another police-involved shooting shook the city this week.

Still reeling from the police shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown this weekend, Tuesday’s shooting rocks an already volatile city. Details are still far from definitive in terms of the second incident, but the occurrence remains indicative of the increasing tensions in the St. Louis suburb over the past several days.

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Multiple reports indicate a St. Louis County police officer fired his weapon at a man who had previously pointed a firearm in his direction. The “Washington Post” reported police responded to a call of four people wearing ski masks and armed with shotguns at an intersection. Police told the paper that they received calls that shots were fired in that same area. After police arrived, people began fleeing the scene.

“One person pointed a handgun directly at an officer, who shot the man,” police spokesperson Brian Schellman told the Post.

This man, who is yet to be identified, was taken to an area hospital in critical condition.

The shooting came on the heels of a rally that had been held earlier in the day at a local Ferguson church to protest the shooting of Michael Brown on Saturday. It was led by Rev. Al Sharpton and other leaders of the African American community. The local teen was shot to death by a Ferguson City police officer in what police officials describe as an assault, but critics describe as an unwarranted and disproportionate use of force. While event organizers urged peaceful protests as the victims await the results of police investigation, many failed to heed the pleas.

Tensions have flared in the days following the shooting of the weaponless Missouri teenager, while many demonstrations have turned hostile leading to further clashes with police and SWAT. At the same time, notoriously opportunistic looters have taken advantage of the situation to benefit themselves and contribute to a rapid spike in crime in an already unsafe neighborhood.

Matters have only been made worse by what critics consider the police department’s lack of urgency in revealing any relevant facts as to the nature and details of the original shooting on Saturday.

As Jon Swaine of The Guardian reports, “The Ferguson city police officer who shot Brown has not been named publicly, but has been placed on paid leave while the shooting is investigated by the separate St Louis county police department. The FBI is also looking into whether the incident caused civil rights violations.”

Swaine goes on to clarify the fundamental conflict at the root of the tension—which has led to both Saturday and Wednesday’s shootings—by stating that, “The official response to Brown’s death has been rejected as insultingly inadequate by many African American residents of Ferguson, a city of about 21,000 people where 67% of the population is black, yet 94% of the police force – and prominent figures in local government, such as the mayor – are white.”

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