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The murder of an unarmed African-American by police in the American city of Columbus, Ohio, sparked a new wave of outrage this week against racial injustice and police brutality in the country.
Andre Maurice Hill, 47, was in the garage of a home Monday night when a police officer who had been called to the scene for a minor incident shot him multiple times.
Bodycam footage shows Hill walking toward the police officer holding a cell phone in his left hand, while his other hand cannot be seen.
Seconds later, the officer fired and Hill collapsed.
The footage is silent and it is unclear why the officer, Adam Coy, fired. Hill did not carry a weapon.
Coy and his colleague waited several minutes before approaching the victim, who was still alive but later died.
According to local media reports, Coy had previously received complaints of the use of excessive force.
On Thursday there will be a memorial service for Hill, the second African American killed by police in Columbus in less than three weeks.
Casey Goodson Jr, 23, was shot multiple times on December 4 as he was returning home. His family say he was holding a sandwich in his hand that authorities mistook for a weapon.
The killings follow a summer in which the United States was rocked by historic protests against racial injustice and police brutality, sparked by the May murder of African American George Floyd.
Floyd, also unarmed, suffocated under the knee of a white cop in Minneapolis. Horrified passersby filmed his death, and the footage quickly went viral.
“Once again, officers see a black man and conclude that he is a criminal and dangerous,” attorney Ben Crump, who defends several families of victims, including Floyd’s, said Wednesday.
He denounced a “tragic succession of shootings involving agents”.
Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther said he was “outraged” by Hill’s death.
He “knew the neighbors of the house where his car was parked on the street,” he told a news conference on Wednesday, describing him as a “guest … not an intruder.”
Ginther said he was “very concerned” “that the two police officers present were not giving Hill first aid. He called for Coy’s” immediate firing. ”
