[ad_1]
According to media reports, a suspect was killed by police following the violent death of an apparently right-wing supporter on the sidelines of the demonstrations in the US city of Portland.
As the American media, including the “New York Times,” unanimously reported in the evening, citing law enforcement sources, the 48-year-old man died after shooting a joint police force and the United States Marshals Service in the town of Lacey, in the neighboring state of Washington.
A spokesman for the Thurston district, southwest of Seattle, told AFP news agency the man was killed Thursday night while trying to escape from four police officers. According to media reports, the man is said to be a supporter of Antifa.
Local emergency services observed the suspect’s home as he left the building and approached a vehicle, agency spokesman Ray Brady said. Since the man appeared to be armed, the police fired several shots before the man escaped. Then more shots were fired. Possession of weapons by the suspect has not been confirmed.
The 48-year-old was suspected of shooting and killing a 39-year-old man who belonged to the right-wing group “Patriot Prayer” on the sidelines of a rally in Portland last Saturday night. The suspect described himself as an “anti-fascist” on the Internet. On Thursday, the “Vice News” portal published an interview with the man in which he implied that he had carried out the fatal shots in Portland.
He wanted to defend himself and a friend with him. “I had no choice,” he said in the interview. According to media reports, Portland police had issued an arrest warrant for the man on the same day. US President Donald Trump had condemned the fatal shooting of the suspected right-wing extremist and called for the perpetrator to be quickly arrested.
In Portland, following the death of African American George Floyd in a brutal police operation in Minneapolis in late May, there have been daily Black Lives Matter rallies and counter-demonstrations for nearly three months.
On Saturday, a parade of Trump supporters went through the city. There were clashes between supporters of the US president and protesters. A video from a “New York Times” reporter showed protesters being fired at a paintball gun from the back of a pickup truck in a caravan. Another car was spraying pepper.
Portland has become something of a hub for nationwide anti-racism protests. Trump had taken a highly controversial step there to contain the protests: he sent federal police officers to the northwestern metropolis of the United States.
Anti-racism protests in Portland and many other cities in the US were recently reignited with the shooting of 29-year-old black man Jacob Blake by a white police officer in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Blake was so seriously injured during the police operation that according to his family, he may never be able to walk again.
