Downtown Dallas: Police officers shot by two or more snipers from elevated positions.

[Drew Phipps]

Update: News article.

Snipers kill five Dallas police during protest over black shootings
Lisa Maria Garza
Jul 8th 2016 5:07AM
http://www.aol.com/article/2016/07/08/tw.../21426172/


DALLAS, July 8 (Reuters) - Snipers operating from rooftops in Dallas killed five police officers and wounded six more in a coordinated attack during one of several protests across the country against the killing of two black men by police this week. Police described Thursday night's ambush as carefully planned and executed and had taken three people into custody before a fourth died from what Dallas-based media said was a self-inflicted gunshot after a standoff that extended into Friday morning. The fourth suspect had exchanged gunfire with police during the standoff at a downtown garage and warned of placing bombs throughout the city. Police have yet to confirm his death. The attack was one of the worst mass shootings of police in U.S. history.


White House officials have spoken with Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings about the shooting that turned the downtown of one of the largest U.S. cities into a sprawling crime scene, unfolding along streets that house major corporations, restaurants and government offices. A spokesman said President Barack Obama, visiting Poland, has been briefed about the sniper shootings that took place as a protest in Dallas was winding up under the watch of the police. No specific motive has been given for the shootings at the downtown protest, one of many held in major cities across the United States on Thursday. New York police made more than a dozen arrests on Thursday night, while protesters briefly shut down one of Chicago's main arteries.


Dallas Police Chief David Brown said the shooters, some in elevated positions, used sniper rifles to fire at the officers in what appeared to be a coordinated attack. "(They were) working together with rifles, triangulating at elevated positions in different points in the downtown area where the march ended up going," Brown told a news conference, adding a civilian was also wounded. "It has been a devastating night. We are sad to report a fifth officer has died," Dallas police said on Twitter.

"WORST NIGHTMARE"


Mayor Rawlings advised people to stay away on Friday morning as police combed the area where large areas have been cordoned off and transport halted. Federal authorities also halted commercial air traffic for the area as police helicopters hovered over the scene. "Our worst nightmare has happened," the mayor said. "It is a heartbreaking moment for the city of Dallas." The Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area is one of the nation's most populous and is home to more than 7 million people.


The use of force by police against against African-Americans in cities from Ferguson, Missouri, to Baltimore and New York has sparked periodic and sometimes violent protests in the past two years and has spawned the Black Lives Matter movement. Anger has intensified when the officers involved in such incidents have been acquitted in trials or not charged at all. The shooting happened as otherwise largely peaceful protests unfolded around the United States after the shooting of Philando Castile, 32, by police near St. Paul, Minnesota, late on Wednesday. His girlfriend posted live video on the internet of the bloody scene minutes afterward, which was widely viewed.


The suspect in the Texas standoff had told police "the end is coming" and that more police were going to be hurt and killed. Brown said the suspect also told police "there are bombs all over the place in this garage and downtown." Police said they were questioning two occupants of a Mercedes they had pulled over after the vehicle sped off on a downtown street with a man who threw a camouflaged bag inside the back of the car. A woman was also taken into custody near the garage where the standoff was taking place. "We are leaving every motive on the table on why this happened and how this happened," Brown said.


Rawlings visited the wounded at Parkland hospital, the same hospital where President John F. Kennedy was taken after he was shot in Dallas in November 1963. Outside, officers stood in formation and saluted as bodies of the officers were about to be transported. One of the officers killed has been identified. He is Brent Thompson, 43, and an officer with Dallas Area Rapid Transit.


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As you can see from the above article, news reports and talking heads have been quick to link the shootings with the peaceful protest march. Although the shooters certainly used the peaceful protest march as an opportunity to draw police officers into their sights, there is no other apparent connection between this ambush and the protest, Black Lives Matter, and the anger of people about officer related violence. (I can safely say that at least one of the shooters (the dead one) did in fact draw officers to his position with un-aimed gunfire.) We should all be careful to realize that the deliberate, or inadvertent, linking of this tragedy to the anger concerning police violence might serve as an convenient excuse justifying a government crackdown on the people's civil liberties.

[Drew Phipps]

Quite possibly people taking a kind of justice into their own hands, not good and not right. But could also be others as yet unidentified trying to fan the flames of discontent. Of which there is much and fully justifiable.

This brings to mind Charles Manson and "Helter Skelter", the race war he was trying to provoke.

[Albert Doyle]

They are just adding the bodies of cops who just went to work that day. Martin King would say they were adding to the problem not helping it.


The problem is national and institutional.


A man who was complying should not have to die for a broken tail light. He should not have to be shot 4 times for reaching for his wallet to show the officer his permit.

[Drew Phipps]

The police say this morning that they used a bomb disposal robot on a second floor to kill a suspect after a lengthy period of negotiation with the suspect. The suspect allegedly made statements about police violence and hating white people.

This story doesn't sound at all like the street shootout, but I am supposing that the street guy could have managed to enter another building and barricade himself in.

[Tracy Riddle]

I'm reminded of this event:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tlatelolco_massacre

At the time, the government and the mainstream media in Mexico claimed that government forces had been provoked by protesters shooting at them.[SUP][1][/SUP] But government documents made public since 2000 suggest that the snipers had been employed by the government. Estimates of the death toll ranged from 30 to 300, with eyewitnesses reporting hundreds dead.

[Albert Doyle]

The murder of citizens by the police without any rights is something the legal and political system has been enforcing recently. It most likely originates from the COINTELPRO Program of the 1960's as it was used against the Black Panthers. It was likely the result of the Bush Administration creating a new regime of semi-fascism.

[Tracy Riddle]

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/09/us/dal....html?_r=0

The police killed that suspect using an explosive delivered by a robot, he said, and arrested three other people. The chief said the snipers had worked together, firing rifles from triangulated positions, some of them looking down from elevated posts in downtown buildings.

What I want to know is, why didn't the DPD have the rooftops secured during this demonstration?

Well, they didn't have rooftops secured during JFK's motorcade down the same street in 1963...

[Magda Hassan]

The chief said the snipers had worked together, firing rifles from triangulated positions, some of them looking down from elevated posts in downtown buildings.

Seems triangulated fire is quite a thing in Dallas....


I am hearing all sorts of things. Nothing substantiated at this time. But I do find it interesting that while the Dallas Police Department tweeted a photo of a black man identifying him as a suspect wanted for questioning (he was later no longer a suspect) but they have not given any details of the known shooters. Age, sex, colour etc.

Then there are these:

[Peter Lemkin]

When you have a trapped and surrounded suspect, you can [and in the past would] wait until they ran out of food and water....now, you send in a robot to blow them up...the real reason is you don't want them to be able to tell who they were and what their motives and connections were - nor be available for trial. Micah Johnson is being named as the single shooter...while other evidence is of AT LEAST three shooters. I think any of this 'information' should be taken with a grain of salt. I can't prove, but strongly suspect, that the 'use' of Dallas for this spectacle is not a coincidence [down to the Black Police Chief], and that the truth is being 'spun', and we are NOT hearing it......

Sadly, expect MUCH more of similar in the USA this summer and beyond. Sadly, a race [and class] 'war' is coming...one that has been simmering since the founding of the USA.

[Drew Phipps]

Details of the shooter killed by DPD:

Dallas shooting suspect: Military veteran with black nationalist sympathies
Gina Cherelus and Erwin Seba
Jul 8th 2016 3:52PM

http://www.aol.com/article/2016/07/08/da.../21427174/


NEW YORK/MESQUITE, Texas, July 8 (Reuters) - Military veteran Micah Xavier Johnson posted an angry rant against white people on a black nationalist Facebook group called Black Panther Party Mississippi on Saturday, denouncing the lynching and brutalizing of black people. Five days later, U.S. authorities say, he took part in the sniper-style killing of five Dallas police officers.

"Why do so many whites (not all) enjoy killing and participating in the death of innocent beings," Johnson, 25, wrote in his Facebook post above a graphic video of people participating in a whale-killing, comparing it to the treatment of black people in the United States. The Facebook group has over 200 members. In what appeared to be Johnson's own Facebook page, he was portrayed as a black nationalist, with images of Black Power and the red, black and green flag sometimes known as the Black Liberation flag. His profile photo showed him with his clenched fist in the air in the familiar Black Power salute. Johnson was also a military veteran who had served as a private first class in the U.S. Army Reserve from March 2009 to April 2015. He was deployed to Afghanistan from November 2013 to July 2014 and earned a number of service medals, according to Army records.


Much remained unknown about Johnson, and attempts to reach family members on Friday were not immediately successful. It was not clear whether he was employed, though NBC News reported that he had been working for a company, Touch of Kindness, that assists mentally challenged children and adults. Public records indicated he lived in Mesquite, a suburb of Dallas, and the Army also listed Mesquite as his hometown. The assault, the deadliest for law enforcement in the United States since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, took place on Thursday night at the end of a protest over the fatal shooting of two black men by police this week in Louisiana and Minnesota. Those deaths renewed public outrage over police treatment of minorities.


Dallas Police Chief David Brown, who did not name Johnson, said police tried unsuccessfully to negotiate an end to an hours-long standoff before sending in a bomb-carrying robot that killed him. During the negotiations, the suspect "said he was upset about the recent police shootings," Brown said. "The suspect said he was upset at white people. The suspect stated that he wanted to kill white people, especially white officers."


FURY AT WHITE PEOPLE

Johnson's July 2 post on the Black Panther Facebook page expressed anger at how white people have treated black people over the years, with references to his ancestors getting beaten, mutilated and killed. "Then they all stand around and smile while their picture is taken with a hung, burned and brutalized black person," he wrote. "They even go to our homeland and shoot our endangered wildlife for sport." Among the pages that Johnson had "liked" on the social media site belonged to a group calling itself the African American Defense League. On Friday morning, the group posted a message calling on "gangs across the nation" to "attack everything in blue except the mail man." His Facebook page also included a photo of him with Professor Griff of the classic hip-hop group Public Enemy. Attempts to reach Griff were unsuccessful.


On Friday, three police cars and several TV news trucks were parked near the large, two-story brick house of Johnson's family on Helen Lane in Mesquite, Texas, a middle-class suburb of Dallas with homes built in the last 10-15 years. Kimberly Smith, a neighbor, said her son went to high school with Johnson. "He was a nice kid. My son was surprised he would cause any problem." Another neighbor, an elderly white woman named Jose' (pronounced Josie) Moore, said she passed Johnson when he was out running. "I would say hi and he wouldn't say anything," Moore said. When Moore saw him identified on TV news today, "I thought, 'My God, that's the man who doesn't speak to me.'"


It was not clear if Johnson's military training aided him in the attack. Army Lieutenant Colonel Major Michael Waltz, a former special forces officer and White House aide, said a video of the shooter during the attack indicated that Johnson was "not only trained, but well trained." The video was taken by somebody at the scene and widely circulated on social media. "The way he raises and lowers the rifle to his shoulder, apparently firing two rounds at a time, with discipline in his movements and use of cover, is what makes it seem as though he has military training," he said. Waltz added that Johnson appeared to have received "close-quarters battle" training, which focuses on urban combat.


(Writing by Joseph Ax; Additional reporting by Daniel Trotta and Mimi Dwyer in New York and Jonathan Landay in Washington; Editing by Frances Kerry)

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So, like I said. This guy just hated white cops, and used the occasion of the protest walk to guarantee a sufficient selection of victims.