The shootings occurred as Americans nationwide took to the streets to demand answers over the killings of two black men in two days.
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Maj. Max Geron tweeted before dawn Friday that primary and secondary sweeps for explosives were complete and no explosives were found. DART, the Dallas Area Rapid Transit agency, operates buses and commuter rail in the city and surrounding suburbs.
It was the greatest loss of life of law enforcement personnel since the September 11 terror attacks in 2001, where 72 officers lost their lives.
Dallas Police Chief David Brown said Friday that the snipers fired ambush-style on officers and appeared to be trying to kill as many as they could.
The officers came from several different agencies, including the Port Authority, New Jersey Police Department, New York City Police Department, New York State Department of Taxation and Finance, New York State Office of Court Administration, New York City Fire Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Secret Service.
President Barack Obama, who is in Warsaw, Poland for a North Atlantic Treaty Organisation summit, said: “We still don’t know all the facts, we do know there’s been a vicious, calculated and despicable act on law enforcement”, Obama said.
Obama is speaking from Warsaw, Poland, where he’s meeting with leaders of the European Union and attending a North Atlantic Treaty Organisation summit.
He said the attacks were a “wrenching reminder” of the sacrifices made by law enforcement officers. The agency said in a statement that 43-year-old officer Brent Thompson was the first officer killed in the line of duty since the agency formed a police department in 1989.
“If you add it all up, the African American and Hispanic pop [sic], who make up only 30% of the general population, make up half of the incarcerated population”, Obama says. The nation was already reeling this week after two separate incidents, one in Louisiana, one in Minnesota, where black suspects were shot dead by police officers. Police say it remains an active scene. Some of the injured officers were taken to Parkland Hospital.
The initial gunfire broke out around 8:45 p.m. Thursday while hundreds of people were gathered to protest fatal police shootings this week in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and suburban St. Paul, Minnesota.
A statement posted on the DART website states that three other DART police officers were also shot during the protest, but they are expected to recover.
Former U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison also noted the news on Twitter: “Sad night in Dallas tonight.We mourn as they are searching for shooters”.
Theresa Williams told The Associated Press that one of the wounded civilians was her sister, 37-year-old Shetamia Taylor.
He said early Friday that “two officers are in surgery and three are in critical condition”.
Burlington police officers will, for now, stop patrolling the city alone. It was not immediately clear whether the man photographed and identified by police was involved in the shootings, or if he had been misidentified. He said the police have a suspect cornered in a garage. No word has been released yet on the extent of the officers’ injuries, the possibility that there could be other victims, or the shooters’ identity.
“It’s obvious that for every action there could be an opposite and equal reaction”, Sessions said Friday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” program. The shootings happened Thursday night in downtown Dallas.
The governor said he’s spoken with Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings and the Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw.
– “This was an attack planned long before – waiting for an opportunity to go”, Moore said.
Police throughout the evening were looking at a variety of “persons of interest”.
Shortly after the first shots rang out, his brother, Cory Hughes, approached police to see if he could assist them.
Richard MdBride’s daughter was one of the officers who survived.
Earlier, he had told police negotiators that “the end is coming” and that “there are bombs all over the place in this garage and downtown”, Brown said. A Facebook video shows Mark unslinging his gun and giving it to officers, encouraged by his brother. Police had earlier reported that that the suspects had threatened to plant a bomb in the downtown area. An additional six officers were wounded.
Before the shootings, protesters and police were supporting one another.
Brown says authorities are not certain all suspects have been located.
But he was released without charge within hours of being arrested after handing himself in to police.
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Lewis said the shootings in Dallas drive home the risk that all officers take and the violence that comes with the uniform. Police then began questioning both occupants of the vehicle.
