Police Make Community Relations Worse With Their Weak Damage Control Tactics, Activists Say

109 Black Men And Boys Killed By Police

UPDATED: 3:08 p.m. ET, April 21, 2021 -- The centuries-old American tradition of police shooting and killing Black males suffered an untraditional jolt on Tuesday when former cop Derek Chauvin was found guilty and convicted on all counts for murdering George Floyd by kneeling on the unarmed, handcuffed man's neck for more than nine minutes. https://twitter.com/TIME/status/1384614198282530816?s=20 But the anomaly of a guilty verdict was far from enough to offset the apparent violent rite of police passage that is still thriving in 2021 and only seems to be gaining momentum instead of slowing. It should give any American citizen pause as a steady number of Black people -- especially males both young and old -- continue to be added to a growing list of victims with what seems like a new shooting every week. MORE: #SayHerName: Black Women And Girls Killed By Police In the wake of repeated brutality and police violence waged on Black communities, a 40-year-old Black man from North Carolina was shot and killed by police on Wednesday morning. https://twitter.com/WAVY_News/status/1384904119551397895?s=20 According to WAVY, the victim was identified as Andrew Brown, a resident of Elizabeth City, North Carolina. Details are still being revealed about the shooting, but according to local law enforcement, the incident took place around 8:30 a.m. as Pasquotank County Sheriff's deputies attempted to serve a search warrant. Brown, who was unarmed and a father of 10, reportedly exited the residence and drove away in his car when police fired a total of six to eight shots. Brown's family says that he did not hurt anyone prior to him being shot. The North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation has been called in to take over the investigation and local authorities will hold a press conference at 3:30 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon to discuss the shooting. A crowd of demonstrators began gathering near the area in protest. Brown's killing comes one day after the guilty verdict in the murder of George Floyd, and the shooting of Ma'Khia Wright, a 16-year-old Columbus, Ohio girl. Brown's name joins a long list of other Black men and boys killed by the police, including but certainly not limited to: Tamir Rice; Botham Shem Jean; E.J. Bradford; and Michael Brown. But two of the most recent names that can tragically be included in this deadly equation are Michael Dean, a 28-year-old father who police shot in the head on Dec. 3, 2019, and Jamee Johnson, a 22-year-old HBCU student who police shot to death after a questionable traffic stop on Dec. 14, 2019. One of the most distressing parts of this seemingly nonstop string of police killings of Black people is the fact that more times than not, the officer involved in the shooting can hide behind the claim that they feared for their lives -- even if the victim was shot in the back, as has become the case for so many deadly episodes involving law enforcement. In a handful of those cases -- such as Antwon Rose, a 13-year-old boy killed in Pittsburgh, and Stephon Clark, a 22-year-old killed in Sacramento, both of whom were unarmed -- the officers either avoided being criminally charged altogether or were acquitted despite damning evidence that the cops' lives were not threatened and there was no cause for them to resort to lethal force or any violence for that matter. Civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who has been retained in so many of these cases, described the above scenarios in his new book, "Open Season," as the "genocide" of Black people. As NewsOne continues covering these shootings that so often go ignored by mainstream media, the below running list (in no certain order) of Black men and boys who have been shot and killed by police under suspicious circumstances can serve as a tragic reminder of the dangers Black and brown citizens face upon being born into a world of hate that has branded them as suspects since birth. Scroll down to learn more about the Black men and boys who have lost their lives to police violence.