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Gunman with possible revenge in mind kills two NYC police officers

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A gunman ambushed and fatally shot two New York City police officers

on Saturday and then killed himself, police said, and a social media

post indicated it may have been in revenge for the police chokehold

death of an unarmed black man.

The officers were killed without warning and at close range as they

sat in their squad car in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn,

Police Commissioner William Bratton told a news conference, flanked by

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio.

"Although we're still learning the details, it's clear that this was

an assassination, that these officers were shot execution style," said

de Blasio.

New York police have come under intense pressure in recent weeks, with

protests erupting after a grand jury declined this month to charge a

white police officer involved in the chokehold death of Eric Garner

during an arrest attempt in July in the borough of Staten Island.

Demonstrations over Garner's death came on top of protests around the

country over another grand jury's decision in November not to indict a

white police officer who fatally shot an unarmed black teenager in

Ferguson, Missouri.

President Barack Obama, who was briefed on the New York killings while

on vacation in Hawaii, has had to calm eruptions of anger over police

brutality against minorities.

The killings were the first time New York City police officers have

been killed by gunfire since 2011 and were bound to fuel anger among

some police against de Blasio, who has had a prickly relationship with

law enforcement.

Bratton identified the gunman as Ismaaiyl Brinsley, 28, and said he

took a shooter's stance on the passenger side of the squad car,

opening fire with a silver semi-automatic handgun. He then fled into a

nearby subway station and died there from a self-inflicted gunshot

wound to the head, Bratton said.

Bratton identified the slain officers as Rafael Ramos, 40, and Wenjian

Liu, 32. Liu had been married for two months. Ramos had a 13-yearold

son.

INSTAGRAM POSTING

An online posting suggested a possible link between Brinsley, who was

black, and anger over the death of Garner.

Screenshots taken by various media showed an Instagram account

attributed to Brinsley with a picture of a black man with wire-rimmed

glasses and a separate picture of a silver pistol.

The account, using the slang insult pig for police, said: "I'm Putting

Wings On Pigs Today. They Take 1 Of Ours … Let's Take 2 of Theirs."

The post included hashtags for Eric Garner and for Michael Brown, the

teenager who was shot dead in August in Ferguson.

Instagram said the account attributed to Brinsley had been deleted.

Bratton was asked whether there was a link between Brinsley and the

weeks of protests over law enforcement, and said this was under

investigation. He added:

"There has been … a very strong anti-police, anti-criminal justice

system, anti-societal set of initiatives under way and one of the

unfortunate aspects sometimes is some people get caught up in these

and go in directions they should not."

He said police would investigate whether Brinsley had been part of

protests in New York and in Atlanta, his last place of residence, over

the Brown and Garner killings.

Brinsley had shot and seriously wounded his ex-girlfriend in Baltimore

County, Maryland, early on Saturday before traveling to Brooklyn,

where he had connections, the police commissioner said.

Attorney General Eric Holder called the killings of the police

officers "barbarism."

Culled from Reuters

Kofi Oppong Kyekyeku

I am a Ghanaian Broadcast Journalist/Writer who has an interest in General News, Sports, Entertainment, Health, Lifestyle and many more.

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