One man critically wounded as Charlotte protests over police killing of Keith Lamont Scott escalate

Note: the headline and body of this post have been updated to reflect the latest information about the man who was injured during the Charlotte protests.

A man was critically wounded as protests in Charlotte, NC over the police killing of Keith Lamont Scott continued on Wednesday night.

Scott, a husband and father of seven, was killed on Tuesday afternoon. Charlotte police admitted that they had been searching for another person when they killed him, but insisted that he had been carrying a gun. His family denied this, saying he was only carrying a book.

Yet another police killing of a black man—Scott’s death came one day after police in Tulsa, OK released video showing the killing of Terence Crutcher, an unarmed black man who had his hands up when police shot him to death—sparked angry protests on Tuesday night. Those protests continued on Wednesday, but things took a grim turn after a man was shot and critically injured. City officials initially said the man had died, and claimed that he had not been shot by police. (That claim was disputed by some protesters on the ground.) They then announced that he had in fact not been killed, and was on life support.

Two other people were also reportedly injured.

Chaos during the protests reportedly spread as protesters were hit with rubber bullets and tear gas by police, bottles were thrown and firecrackers were set off. North Carolina governor Pat McCrory eventually declared a state of emergency and sent in the National Guard.

This story is developing.

 
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