SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
shooting
At Least 120 Killed as Shootings and Explosions Stir Chaotic Scenes in Paris
Gunmen and bombers attacked busy restaurants, bars and a concert hall at six locations around Paris on Friday evening
Nov 13, 2015
This is a developing story...
Update (8:58 PM EDT): Paris in lockdown after deadly attacks
France 24reports:
At least 120 people are reported to have died in a wave of simultaneous attacks in the French capital on Friday evening, an official at Paris City hall said early Saturday morning.
Gunmen and bombers attacked busy restaurants, bars and a concert hall at six locations around Paris on Friday evening, killing scores of people in what a shaken President Francois Hollande described as an unprecedented terrorist attack.
The apparently coordinated gun and bomb assault came as the country, a founder member of the US-led coalition waging air strikes against Islamic State group fighters in Syria and Iraq, was on high alert for terrorist attacks ahead of a global climate conference due to open later this month.
Hollande, who was attending an international football match with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier when several explosions took place outside the national stadium, declared a state of emergency in the Paris region and announced the closure of France's borders to stop perpetrators escaping.
"This is a horror," the visibly shaken president said in a midnight television address to the nation before chairing an emergency cabinet meeting.
Earlier:
Reports coming out of Paris on Friday night indicate that multiple shootings and a series of explosions have left numerous people dead and others injured.
According to the BBC:
At least 18 people have been killed in several shootings in the French capital, Paris, as well as explosions at the Stade de France.
At least one man opened fire with an automatic gun at the Petit Cambodge restaurant in the 11th district.
Liberation newspaper reports four deaths. It also reports shootings near the Bataclan arts centre.
The Guardian, which is providing live updates here, subsequently added:
Police officials confirmed that there had been a shootout at a Paris restaurant in the 10th arrondissement amid busy Friday night bars and cafes. Then another shootout took place near the Bataclan concert venue in the nearby 11th arrondissment. Hostages have been taken at the Bataclan, police confirmed to AFP.
At around the same time, there was a series of explosions outside the Stade de France, north of Paris, during a France-Germany friendly football match. The French president Francois Hollande was at the match and was evacuated from the stadium to the French interior ministry for a crisis meeting.
A police official confirmed to Associated Press that there had been one explosion in a bar near the stadium.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Two Confirmed Dead In Shooting Near Canadian Parliament
Police are searching for "multiple shooters"
Oct 22, 2014
Update 2:40 EST:
Two people are confirmed dead from Wednesday's shooting.
The Canadian soldier shot while guarding Canada's War Memorial has reportedly died from his injuries. Furthermore, a "male suspect" is confirmed dead.
Police are reportedly searching cars leaving attempting to travel from Ottawa to Quebec and going door to door in downtown Ottawa, where schools remain on lockdown.
"At an afternoon press conference, [Royal Canadian Mounted Police] would not say whether another gunman was believed at large," CBC reports.
CBC continues:
Ottawa Civic Hospital confirmed three people were taken to hospital. Two are stable, and one has a gunshot wound. The hospital was referring calls on the status of the other victim to the Department of National Defence.
Earlier:
Downtown Ottawa buildings are on lockdown after multiple shots were reportedly fired near Parliament and at soldiers guarding Canada's War memorial on Wednesday morning.
Canadian publication rabble.careports:
A gunman shot and very seriously wounded a Canadian Forces soldier at the War Memorial in Ottawa at about 10:00 a.m. this morning, Wednesday, October 22.
According to witnesses, the gunman then hijacked a car, without harming the driver, and drove onto Parliament Hill.
There are reports that the gunman then entered the main entrance of the Centre Block of Parliament and shot repeatedly and indiscriminately.
Journalists who were on the scene at the time report that some people there were gravely injured, but there are no details as to the extent of casualties yet.
Marc Soucy of the Ottawa Police said there were "numerous gunmen" responsible for what witnesses say were dozens of shots, according toCNN.
This footage from inside the Parliament Hill building was captured by a Globe & Mail reporter on the scene at the time:
Inside Parliament in Ottawa during 2014 shootingOn October 22, 2014 a gunman opened fire at the War Memorial in Ottawa and then had a shootout with police inside Centre ...
A Canadian soldier has reportedly been struck by gunfire, and further information about this or other injuries was not immediately available.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Despite Video Evidence, Grand Jury Refuses to Indict on Ohio Walmart Killing
Sep 25, 2014
Despite store surveillance footage that showed a young black man, John Crawford III, casually talking on his cell phone and clearly not threatening other shoppers in an Ohio Walmart store when he was shot and killed, a grand jury on Wednesday announced it would not indict the police officer, Sean Williams, for firing on the man.
The video, which prosecutors had kept out of the public domain until after the grand jury made its decision, was released shortly after the announcement not to indict the officer was made and shows that though Crawford was holding an unpackaged air rifle that he picked up on one of the store's shelves, he was shot from the side while talking on the phone and appeared to be given no warning or understand that police were even on the scene.
Watch the video: (Warning: graphic material)
John Crawford III Walmart shooting: Surveillance video released of shopper’s final momentsOn August 5th John Crawford III picked up a BB rifle from the sporting goods section while shopping at Walmart. As he walked ...
In a statement made through their lawyers, Crawford's parents expressed incomprehension and disgust over the decision not to indict Williams and said they were "heartbroken that justice was not done in the tragic death of their only son." The family and the attorney's representing them said the video footage makes it clear that the shooting was neither "justified" nor "reasonable" and that Crawford--who was speaking to the mother of his two children at the time he was killed--was not posing a threat anyone in the store, least of all the police officers.
"It makes absolutely no sense that an unarmed 22-year-old man would be killed doing what any American citizen does every day: shopping at a Walmart store," read the statement.
As the Guardianreports:
Police had repeatedly been told via a customer on the line to a 911 dispatcher that John Crawford III was pointing the gun at shoppers and may have loaded it with bullets. But the footage, released by prosecutors on Wednesday, shows Crawford walking past several customers in the minutes before he died without pointing the gun at them.
In the final moments of the footage from 5 August (warning, graphic images), Crawford is seen standing at the end of an aisle, pointing the gun downwards at his side, occasionally swinging it and holding it towards a store shelf containing pet products. Oblivious to the unfolding police response, Crawford, 22, talks casually on the phone with the mother of his two young sons.
A grand jury in Greene County declined on Wednesday to indict Sean Williams, the police officer who shot Crawford, on charges of murder, reckless homicide or negligent homicide. After hearing from 18 witnesses and considering video and audio evidence, the jurors concluded on their third day in session that Williams acted reasonably in shooting Crawford dead at the store in Beavercreek, a suburb of Dayton.
Backed by Ohio Gov. John Kasich and the state's Attorney General Mike DeWine, both Republicans, the Justice Department has vowed to review the case.
The Washington Post adds:
Crawford's death did not attract as much national attention as the deaths of Michael Brown in Missouri or Eric Garner in New York. But all three had something in common: Crawford, Brown and Garner were all black men who died after encounters with police, with these situations drawing increased scrutiny to the way police officers use force.
"We are saddened and outraged by the Grand Jury's decision to not indict these officers that acted maliciously and carelessly when they killed John Crawford III," Rashad Robinson, executive director of the group ColorofChange.org, said in a statement.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular