An eyewitness to the killing of unarmed Ezell Ford by Los Angeles police revealed to the Huffington Post Wednesday that he heard an officer shout “shoot him” before three bullets were fired at the victim.
In a statement issued by the LAPD, they said it was unknown if the suspect had any gang affiliations, but according to witness, Leroy Hill, the suspect was not gang affiliated at all.
“He wasn’t a gang banger at all,” Hill said. “I was sitting across the street when it happened. So as he was walking down the street, the police approached him, whatever was said I couldn’t hear it, but the cops jumped out of the car and rushed him over here into this corner. They had him in the corner and were beating him, busted him up, for what reason I don’t know he didn’t do nothing. The next thing I know I hear a ‘pow!’ while he’s on the ground. They got the knee on him. And then I hear another ‘pow!’ No hesitation. And then I hear another ‘pow!’ Three times.”
At one point when police had Ford on the ground, Hill said he heard an officer yell “shoot him.”
This shooting came just days after the controversial death of 18-year-old unarmed Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, who was also fatally shot by police officers.
On Wednesday morning in South L.A., a group of around ten middle-aged men gathered at a makeshift sidewalk memorial lined with candles and signs that read “Police brutality must stop.”
SOURCE: HuffPost | PHOTO CREDIT: Screengrab
