Black Lives Matter protests in New York City
The Black Lives Matter movement began in 2013 at the end of the trial of George Zimmerman for the shooting death of African-American teen Trayvon Martin.
[1] A year later, the phrase and the movement surrounding it came to national attention following the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and the killing of Eric Garner on Staten Island, New York.
[1] There is a long history of civil unrest in New York City related to race and policing preceding the coalescing of Black Lives Matter, and the New York Police Department has been the subject of frequent criticism for its treatment of black citizens, including use of racial profiling, its stop-and-frisk program, and the use of mass arrests and other aggressive tactics against protesters.
[2] There have been several cases of controversial use of force which attracted national attention, such as the shootings of Clifford Glover, Sean Bell, Eleanor Bumpurs, Gidone Busch, Amadou Diallo, Ramarley Graham, and Timothy Stansbury.
[3] On July 17, 2014, New York City Police Department (NYPD) officers approached Eric Garner on suspicion of selling single cigarettes without tax stamps.
[8] At the Harlem event and at a protest in Staten Island the same day, he highlighted the use of a chokehold, which is not allowed by the NYPD, as well as the lack of response to a person repeatedly telling police that "I can't breathe".
[9] On July 29, WalkRunFly, a company formed by Tony Award winners Warren Adams and Brandon Victor Dixon, created a guerrilla theater event in Times Square whereby a flashmob led by actor Daniel J. Watts gathered outside NYPD Headquarters to give a protest performance.
[15][14][16] Mayor Bill de Blasio gave a press conference explaining the importance of the phrase "Black Lives Matter" and describing how he had to talk to his son about possible dangers when engaging with police.
New York City Councilman Rory Lancman first proposed a bill to criminalize chokeholds in 2014, after the killing of Eric Garner, but it was met with strong criticism from the powerful police unions and de Blasio threatened to veto it.
[38][27] In the wake of Floyd's murder, on June 8, City Council moved to pass the legislation, expanding the original ban to cover any action which "restricts the flow of air or blood by compressing the windpipe, diaphragm, or the carotid arteries" while making an arrest.
[39][40] One of the demands made by protesters was to defund the NYPD, moving part of the budget to support communities in other ways, following years of responsibilities being added to the jobs of police.
[45] The City Hall occupation lasted for a little over three weeks, with the location acting as a hub for protestors meeting others, seeking emergency medical care, food and water, education, rest.
The murder of George Floyd triggered broader civil unrest against systemic racism towards black people in the United States.
Cell phone video captured by protesters at the scene brought significant controversy on social media over the tactics used by law enforcement, with some making comparisons to use of federal forces in Portland, Oregon.
[46] The NYPD that evening stated in a series of tweets that the suspect was wanted in a connection of multiple instances of property damage to police cameras around the time protesters were engaged in Occupy City Hall and that during the arrest they were "assaulted with rocks and bottles".
sponsored by Black Lives Matter in Murray Hill were injured following a vehicle driving through the crowd, resulting in six being hospitalized and the arrest of a 52-year-old woman who faced reckless endangerment charges.
[59] In June 2020, a large mural was painted on Fulton Street in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, displaying the words "Black Lives Matter" in yellow letters and the names of people killed by racial violence like George Floyd.
[60][61][62] In July, New York elected officials painted another similar mural on 5th Avenue in Manhattan, directly in front of Trump Tower.
