(Newswire.net — July 9, 2016) — Hours after the US military veteran of African ancestry shot at white police officers leaving five dead and seven wounded in Dallas, another former member of the United States Army, also African American, randomly fired at cars and police officers on a highway in Tennessee.
One woman has been killed and three other people, including one police officer, were wounded, reports the Associated Press.
Similar to the Dallas sniper, who was a reservist and veteran, the attacker from Tennessee, Lakeem Keon Scott (37), also a soldier, said he was motivated by police brutality and the shootings of African Americans in the US.
In Tennessee, civilians were caught in the shooting, one of them was 44-year-old Jennifer Rooney, a mother of two kids, who was a newspaper carrier driving down the highway.
Lakeem Keon Scott, who was armed with an assault rifle, a pistol and a large amount of ammunition, was wounded in a shootout with police and was taken to hospital in serious but stable condition.
According to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, the preliminary investigation determined that Scott was also involved in other incidents.
Officers in Georgia and Missouri have also been targets of attacks after two African Americans were killed by police in Louisiana and Minnesota.
The policeman who was shot in St. Louis, Missouri, was transported to the hospital and is in stable condition, officials said. Police described the suspect as African American. He was arrested shortly after police started the search.
Another police officer was wounded in a shootout with an unknown male in Valdosta, Georgia. Unfortunately, the policeman in question is in bad condition, police have said.
At the same time, several thousands of people protested on Friday in US cities in the aftermath of the police shootings which left two African-American dead.
“Who can you call when the killers wear badges,” is one of the banners which were worn by the demonstrators. They marched through the streets of Atlanta, Georgia, Houston, Texas, and San Francisco on Friday, while a large number of citizens protested in front of the White House in Washington, the AP reports.
Leaders of the movement “Black Lives Matter”, which has become a mantra for people protesting police violence against African Americans, disavowed the violence in Dallas, in a post on its web page, but have promised to hold marches this weekend.