Officers used tear gas, and then a reporter heard one shot and saw a man lying in the street near the hotel entrance.
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Authorities tried to quell public anger and correct what they characterized as false information Wednesday as Charlotte dealt with a second night of violent protests, adding itself to the list of USA cities that have erupted in violence over the death of a black man at the hands of police.
Video from WCCB-TV in Charlotte showed police in riot gear stretched across a two-lane road confronting protesters at the apartment complex later in the night. Along with the man critically injured, paramedics said two other people and six police officers suffered minor injuries.
Police then unleashed volleys of rubber bullets, tear gas and flash-bang grenades to disperse the protesters, who began hurling fireworks and debris at officers outside the hotel. Police fired what appeared to be tear gas, sending the protesters scattering.
The killing inflamed racial tensions in a city that seemed to have steered clear of the troubles that engulfed other places.
Wednesday’s protest started as a downtown prayer vigil, but an angry group left the peaceful event and marched through downtown Charlotte. The Observer put the number of injured officers at 16, and said at least seven of them needed to be hospitalized.
Violent protesters rampaged through parts of downtown Charlotte as anger continued to build over the deadly police shooting of a black man and the wildly different stories about what happened from authorities and the victim’s family and neighbors. CNN’s Ed Lavandera was attacked by a protester while he was reporting live Wednesday night.
Officers were searching for another man, a suspect with outstanding warrants, when they spotted Scott emerging from a vehicle and armed with a handgun, police said.
Authorities said the officer who shot Scott is black, and they identified him as Brentley Vinson, who has worked for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg police force since July 2014.
Protesters began demonstrating again Wednesday evening at police headquarters in Charlotte.
According to a statement from the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department, Scott was carrying a gun and “posed an imminent deadly threat to the officers” on the scene.
His family maintains he was holding a book, and not a gun, when he was killed.
The police chief also said the officer who shot Scott was in plainclothes, wearing a vest with a police logo, and was accompanied by other officers in full uniform.
Putney said police recovered a gun and found no book at the scene. The plainclothes officer wasn’t wearing a body camera, but the other officers were. “Any violence directed toward our citizens or police officers or destruction of property should not be tolerated”, Mr McCrory said in a statement.
“My daddy is dead!” the woman screams on the video.
“It’s time to change the narrative, because I can tell you from the facts that the story is a little bit different as to how it’s been portrayed so far, especially through social media”, the chief said. The case ended in a mistrial last summer.
“Fatal shot uptown was civilian on civilian”, the southern USA city said in a statement on Twitter.
At one point, television news helicopters showed protesters on the loop highway around downtown, trying to stop cars for several minutes before police arrived.
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On Tuesday, she said, Scott had only a book in his hands and was following orders.
