Protesters gather in Providence after police shootings

July 10, 2016 10:53 am

By: The Associated Press

news@abc6.com

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) _ About 200 people took to the streets of Providence to peacefully protest after the police shootings of black men in Louisiana and Minnesota last week.

Protesters gathered at the city’s India Point Park on Saturday evening in support of the Black Lives Matter movement.

Protesters carried a coffin from South Water Street to the park in a symbolic funeral procession to memorialize Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, the two black men shot and killed by police.

Organizer Michael Araujo said the procession was focused on the black lives lost rather than the five police officers who were shot and killed at a Black Lives Matter rally in Dallas on Thursday.

He said black lives are not memorialized by heads of state, unlike police officers killed in the line of duty.