Johnson, who was an Army veteran described as a “loner”, reportedly insisted on speaking with a black negotiator and wrote the letters “RB” among other markings in his own blood on the wall of a parking garage.
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Brown also revealed details about Johnson’s negotiations with police, saying he laughed at authorities, sang and at one point asking how many officers he had shot.
The fatal shooting of the five officers has not slowed the protests, and more demonstrations against police violence broke out in several USA cities on Saturday.
Police believe that Johnson had been planning these attacks for some time and that the recent police shootings, where two black men were killed, triggered Johnson’s fatal shooting spree.
In Wisconsin, a man posted calls on social media for black men to gun down white officers, and a woman in IL threatened in an online video to shoot and kill any officer who pulled her over, police said. Tensions continued as on Saturday, shots were fired at the San Antonio Police headquarters, and the Dallas headquarters was subject to a threat that led to a SWAT presence that same day.
Both President Obama and former President George W. Bush are scheduled to appear today in Dallas at a memorial service for the fallen officers.
Johnson’s military training aided his ability to shoot and rapidly move to other positions to fire again, single-handedly “triangulating” his fire so that police at first believed their were multiple shooters.
The deaths in Baton Rouge and St. Paul were the latest in a series of high-profile and controversial killings of black men by police in cities including New York, Ferguson, Missouri, Chicago and Baltimore.
The chief also said that, “based on evidence of bombmaking materials and a journal” found at Johnson’s home in Mesquite, Tex., “we’re convinced that this suspect had other plans”, possibly for a larger attack.
“For our officers, they were suspects”, he said.
“The military was not what Micah thought it would be”, Mrs. Johnson said.
The city was also getting ready for the funerals for the slain officers.
The chief told the network that Micah Xavier Johnson was “determined to hurt more officers”, and would have done so had the authorities not sent in a “robot bomb” to kill the 25-year-old.
Sunday evening, some protestors clashed with the police and a minimum of 48 people were detained.
For the one man known to be responsible for the deaths of five officers, Brown said it was obvious “he thought what he was doing was righteous”.
A search of Johnson’s Dallas-area home turned up bomb-making materials and a manual in which he wrote about military tactics.
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NEWS BRIEF The Dallas Police Department will review more than 170 hours of footage from body cameras worn by police at a demonstration against police violence last week where a sniper killed five officers and injured nine more, the department’s chief said Monday.
