Police deaths worst since 9/11
DALLAS – The gunman killed in a stand-off with Dallas police said he was upset about the police shootings of black people and wanted to kill white officers, the city’s police chief has said.
The suspect told police that he was working alone, Police Chief David Brown told reporters.
Five Dallas police officers were killed and seven wounded by snipers during peaceful protests against the shooting of black men by police, officials say.
Three people are in custody.
Mr Brown said the suspect had been killed when police used explosives placed by a robot to end a tense stand-off in a building where he was holed up.
He said the gunman had told a negotiator that he was “upset about Black Lives Matter [protest movement], he said he was upset about the recent police shootings. The suspect said he was upset at white people. The suspect stated that he wanted to kill white people, especially white officers.”
Mr Brown added: “He said he was not affiliated with any groups, and he did this alone.”
Gunfire broke out as demonstrators marched through the city. Police described the ambush as carefully planned and executed.
The protests came after this week’s deaths of Philando Castile in Minnesota and Alton Sterling in Louisiana.
President Barack Obama, who is attending a Nato summit in Poland, called it a “vicious, calculated and despicable attack on law enforcement”. He said the entire city of Dallas was grieving and the “tight-knit US police community feels this loss to their core”.
The Dallas attack marks the deadliest day for US law enforcement officers since the 9/11 attacks in 2001 and it comes the same week as two high profile shootings in Baton Rouge and in Minnesota. National protests took place in a number of cities around the country.
Peaceful protests took place in Washigton, New York, Boston, and Los Angeles without any inciden
