Two Baton Rouge Police Department officers and one sheriff’s deputy were killed, and one sheriff’s deputy was critically wounded.
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One of those killed was Alton Sterling, shot by a police officer in Baton Rouge two days before the Dallas attack.
A gunman killed five police officers in Dallas earlier this month during a demonstration triggered by the fatal police shooting of two African-American men whose dying moments were captured in shocking video footage that went viral online.
Three police officers shot dead by masked gunman in Baton RougeThe shooting, less than a mile from police headquarters, added to the tensions across the country between the black community and police.
Louisiana State Police Superintendent Colonel Mike Edmonson told reporters the gunman was killed, and there are no suspects at large.
More details have emerged about Gavin Long, who was from Kansas City, Missouri, including his service history.
The shooting was the fourth high-profile deadly encounter in the United States – and second in Baton Rouge – involving police over the past two weeks.
CBS reports that Long is African American although that has not been confirmed by the authorities. Long, who is black, turned 29 yesterday.
Three officers died; the other were hospitalized in critical condition, a source told CNN.
Claire Langlois, a Baton Rouge resident who worked at Laser Tag of Baton Rouge in 2008, met Jackson when he worked as an off-duty security officer there.
In Baton Rouge while delivering a speech on shooting incident, Obama said that, “though divisions exist in the country, everyone should now “focus on words and actions that can unite this country rather than divide it further”.
The latest shooting targeting police prompted safety precautions here, where officers are now required to patrol in pairs.
The three officers who were killed Sunday have been identified as Deputy Brad Garafola and police officers Montrell Jackson and Matthew Gerald.
Records provided by the US Marines show Long received a number of awards during his five years in the military, including a good conduct medal. Another officer was being treated for non-life-threatening injuries, hospital officials said.
It was followed a day later by the shooting death of another black man in Minnesota, whose girlfriend live-streamed the aftermath of the traffic encounter on Facebook. In uniform I get nasty hateful looks and out of uniform some consider me a threat.
“I’m affiliated with the spirit of justice, nothing more nothing less”, he said.
“We thank our officers who have fallen in the line of duty, we pray for their families and we pray for peace everywhere”, Holden said.
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Under that name, Long also tweeted a link to a news story about Dallas shooter Micah Johnson and said the shooter was “one of us!” A spokeswoman for the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups, said she had no information about that.
