Story Description: Everyone remembers the day. For a moment the entire country stopped while watching the video of George Floyd. In a time when everyone was terrified of the coronavirus, there was another fear that every black person has everyday, and the fear was shown on a 8:46 iPhone video. In the same way as Sean Bell, Oscar Grant, Eric Gardner, and Stephon Clark, there has always been instances of police brutality in America that received national uproar. What followed became one of the biggest uprisings in America since the LA riots. 

First Caption: A protester throws firecrackers inside the Old Courthouse in downtown Louisville, Ky. People surrounded the building and threw rocks and fireworks into the building before the Louisville police threw tear gas at the crowd for them to disperse. Hundreds surrounded the Courthouse and the Louisville Police Department Headquarters while throwing firecrackers, rocks, and bottles through the windows. The community in Louisville would follow suit with protesting after the initial uprising in Minneapolis. Louisville already had their own ongoing issue with the shooting death of Breonna Taylor, but the tension during the last week of May of 2020 lead to intense rioting and protest in the city.

Two nights after the death of Rayshard Brooks, protestors stormed the intersection of Pryor Avenue. Without any Atlanta police in sight during the time, a few in the crowd stormed the gas station next door to the Wendy’s with intentions to loot, but another group of people persuaded the crowd to go against the idea. Instead a few decided too loot at the Lennox Mall, while some went back home, and others stayed through the night to protest.

“This ain’t Call of Duty anymore, every time you kill one of our own, we going to make some noise.” A protestor breaks down in tears with a fist in the air for the memory of Rayshard Brooks. The shooting death of Brooks at the hands of an Atlanta police officer at a Wendy’s lead to massive local protest as protestors would turn the location into a peace center for a few weeks before the local government eventually blocked off the Wendy’s for people to massively protest.

Rival gang members hold up opposing gang flags tied together in solidarity during massive protest in downtown Atlanta during the uprising after the death of George Floyd.

A protestor (center) paces with a uzi as protestors block off a busy intersection with vehicles in Atlanta, Ga. This followed within days of the shooting death of Rayshard Brooks outside of a Wendy’s by Atlanta police officer Garrett Rolfe. “I’ma clear the block. They not coming down here. I’m not going to kill my brother. I’m not going to hurt my sister. Cracker I’m coming for your ass,” the protester said.

In the middle of the night protestors drove to the Governors Mansion of Georgia Governor Brian Kemp to protest the aftermath of the shooting death of Rayshard Brooks in Atlanta. Protestors yelled with local sheriffs, police, before leaving after an hour.

A protester lights his blunt as an American flag is burned to the ground in downtown Atlanta.

The Louisville Police guard a street in downtown Louisville. Police would soon throw tear gas into the crowds to disperse the protestors.

Protestors do an interview with a French news station two nights after the death of Rayshard Brooks. “All of us out here. You want to throw us up under the jail. You want to shoot somebody cause they went to sleep. What if we run up on your ass and shoot your ass. Y’all going to keep shooting us ? Fuck looting, we going to just start straight shooting,” one of the protestors said.

Dakota Walton, 7, visited along with her father the Wendy’s location of the deadly shooting of Rayshard Brooks by a police officer. The location would turn into a location of protest. Even Atlanta rapper Lil Baby used the location for a front page cover for Rolling Stone Magazine. The protest of Rayshard Brooks would soon became a memory and life moved on. Black people wondered when the story would happen again. Then came James Blake, then Dijon Kizzee, then the footage of Daniel Prude was released. The tension continued in a country that black people have always felt treated them like second class citizens.