In his letter, Obama highlighted the officers who have been ambushed and killed this month in Dallas and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, saying the victims exemplified the important work done by police.
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(AP Photo/Gerald Herbert). Millville, N.J. police chaplain Robert Ossler prays Monday, July 18, 2016, at a makeshift memorial at the fatal shooting scene in Baton Rouge, La., where several law enforcement officers were killed on Sunday.
Louisiana State Police Superintendent Colonel Mike Edmonson said there was no doubt that the dead and wounded officers were intentionally targeted and assassinated.
Obama opened by praising police for “time and again, [making] the split-second decisions that could mean life or death for you and many others in harm’s way”. And that is not what justice looks like. “We must continue the constructive path of seeking justice for Alton Sterling and will do so”. “It’s just pure unadulterated evil”.
“As we bind up our wounds, we must come together to ensure that those who try to divide us do not succeed”, Obama said in the letter.
Since one of his YouTube videos was posted from Dallas on July 10th, it’s likely he made the trip to Baton Rouge from Dallas.
One of the people paying his respects Tuesday to law enforcement officers was LSU football coach Les Miles, a prominent figure in a city where the Tigers’ purple and gold colors can be seen flying everywhere. Indeed, it turns out that historical surveys of crime show that violence goes up during and after wars, because once you train people to kill, you can’t really turn it off.
It began around 8:40 a.m. CT, after Long got out of his rental vehicle, a Chevrolet Malibu, with a semi-automatic 5.56 caliber rifle and a 9 mm pistol, Edmonson said. Workers at a few businesses near Triple S also said they hadn’t noticed Long.
“I’m a police officer”.
Authorities believe the first 911 call came in, reporting a ‘dude with a rifle, ‘ as he returned to his vehicle.
Nicholas Tullier, 41, was gunned down inside his squad vehicle Sunday after cold-blooded shooter Gavin Long had already killed three Baton Rouge police officers.
“If you’re not standing on your rights, then you have no rights”, Long warns in the footage, apparently uploaded to the Internet in the days before Sunday’s bloodshed, though it remains unclear exactly when the video was shot. He returned fire until the very end, ‘ the sheriff said.
Long stalked the area, searching, as more 911 calls poured in and officers arrived. He also said: “I AM restored to my own aboriginal-indigenous appellation … without colorable law (legal) contract from GAVIN EUGENE LONG to Cosmo Ausar Setepenra in accord with the laws, customs, religious practices, traditions, distinct identities, characteristics and divine principles and language (s) of my Ancestors …”
Pierce said he was friends with Alton Sterling, the black man shot by white officers two weeks ago.
The siege was over by about 8:48 a.m.
A second 5.56-caliber rifle was found in the Malibu, police said.
One of the officers, Nicholas Tullier, is clinging to life with gunshots to his head and stomach. On Tuesday, an officer with the Kansas City, Kansas, police department died after he was shot in his vehicle as he was approaching people matching the description of suspects in an earlier shooting. Behind him, Edwards began to cry.
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During a call to dispatch, an officer said, “unknown where the shots are coming from”. Throughout the early stages of the Republic National Convention, there has already been a hard push from the right to paint the president as being apathetic to the unfortunate deaths of police officers around the nation. “This is why. Because we are up against a force that is not playing by the rules”. “They didn’t play by the rules in Dallas, and they didn’t play by the rules here”.
