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Lawyers for one of the wounded law enforcement officers filed the complaint Friday in US District Court for the Middle District of Louisiana against various arms of the Black Lives Matter movement and leaders including DeRay Mckesson and Johnetta Elzie.

The complaint alleges Black Lives Matter and its leaders are responsible for the shooting because they "incited the violence against police in retaliation for the death (sic) of black men shot by police," and "did nothing to dissuade the ongoing violence and injury to police."

"In fact, they justified the violence as necessary to the movement and war," the complaint says.

The person who filed the lawsuit is named in the complaint only as Officer John Doe Smith. It says he is 42 with two children and is permanently disabled as a result of the numerous injuries he suffered in the ambush.

Smith, the complaint says, was shot through his abdomen, left shoulder and left side of his head. The shot to his abdomen "tore up his intestines," requiring 16 surgeries and causing recurring infections. Medical staff must attend to the exit wound daily, it says.

The shot to Smith's head almost tore off his left ear, which needed to be sewn back on, the complaint says. His skull was shattered and he lost brain matter on the left side, in an area controlling communication. His left eye stays mostly closed with the eyeball turned outward, it says.

"John Doe Police Officer was strong and vibrant and he has been struggling everyday, fighting to live, and fighting to get better," the complaint says. It seeks at least $75,000 in compensatory damages.

It is not clear why the officer filed the complaint under a pseudonym.

Donna Grodner, the attorney for the officer who filed the suit, told CNN she wasn't authorized to speak about the case.

Armed with a rifle, he fatally shot Officers Matthew Gerald, 41, and Montrell Jackson, 32, outside the store as soon as he saw them.

Sheriff's Deputy Brad Garafola, who apparently was responding to reports of a man with a rifle, heard the shots and took cover, but then ran to help one of the downed officers. That's when Long opened fire, killing Garafola.

Long then shot Officer Chad Montgomery, who had pulled up in front of the building. The bullet grazed his head.

In a nearby parking lot, Sheriff's Deputy Nicholas Tullier, then 41, was in his cruiser to run the tag on Long's car when the gunman emerged from the woods and opened fire, shooting as he walked toward the vehicle.

Tullier was shot once in the head and twice in the abdomen and was in a coma for months.

Long took shots at another arriving deputy, Bruce Simmons, 51, shattering the bone from his elbow to his shoulder. Simmons now has a titanium rod in his arm.

SWAT officers then arrived on scene and shot Long in the leg, causing him to fall to the ground. As Long reached for his weapon, five SWAT officers fired, killing him.

The complaint describes in detail numerous protests that erupted across the country over several years, spurred by the shooting deaths of black men at the hands of police, and lists instances of violence, looting and vandalism at protests in Ferguson, Missouri; Baltimore; McKinney, Texas; Dallas and Baton Rouge.

The suit notes Mckesson's involvement in Black Lives Matter, and it points to his participation in the protests and his appearances in the media when he was introduced as a leader of the movement or a protest organizer.

When violence erupted at some of the protests, the complaint says, Mckesson and other Black Lives Matter leaders "failed to disavow the violence and urged its followers that violence was part of revolution," the complaint says.

"By embracing and supporting violence in protest that could have been conducted peacefully, BLM declared a virtual war on police," it says.

When reached for comment, Mckesson told CNN, "This is the second lawsuit an officer has filed against me from Baton Rouge. ... I'm confident it has no merit."

Elzie had no comment, and other defendants from Black Lives Matter could not be immediately reached for comment.

Mckesson and Elzie were present for protests in Baton Rouge in July 2016 held in response to the officer-involved shooting deaths of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge and Philando Castile near Minneapolis earlier that month.

The suit says they came to protest and "to incite others to violence against police and other law enforcement officers."

Mckesson was arrested during the protests on July 9, though he told CNN days later the arrest was unlawful because he was complying with police requests to move back at the time.

The lawsuit also says Long's actions when he killed the Baton Rouge officers "followed and mimicked those of another BLM activist who killed several officers in Dallas just days earlier."

Investigators identified the Dallas gunman as Micah Xavier Johnson, 25, a military veteran who had served in Afghanistan.

Long, who acted alone in the shooting, traveled to Baton Rouge after stopping in Dallas shortly after the shooting to get revenge for the recent killings, the complaint says, suggesting that Black Lives Matter encouraged the behavior.

CNN's Shawn Nottingham and Melissa Gray contributed to this report.

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Baton Rouge officer sues Black Lives Matter - cnn.com

A Black Lives Matter march is planned for Hampton Roads Monday night, according to event organizers.

The organization #BlackLivesMatter757 will march throughout the region starting at 7:57 p.m., the group posted on social media.

The organization was spearheaded July 10, 2016, in light of the the national Black Lives Matter movement and aimsto give "concerned citizens within the Hampton Roads area a voice, a platform, a way to join in the national fight for social justice," according to the organization's website.

Marches will start at the same time in Hampton at Mercury Boulevard, Newport News near Rouse Tower at Jefferson Avenue and Mercury Boulevard, Portsmouth at High Street and Virginia Beach at the Oceanfront and Norfolk on Granby Street, the organization posted on social media. No specific addresses were released.

Newport News and Hampton police departments released statements about the planned marches.

"Officers will be on-hand to ensure a peaceful First Amendment demonstration and are prepared to manage and coordinate traffic flow in order to provide for the safety of the demonstrators, as well as the public," Newport News police said on Facebook. Alternate routes will be posted on the department's South Precinct twitter page.

Hampton police will also set up patrols in the area to facilitate pedestrians and drivers on the road, said spokesman Matt Bond.

"There has not been a permit obtained by the organizers of this event; however, there has not been an official decision made regarding any applicable law enforcement action that may be taken," he said.

Bond said decisions about enforcement would be made during the event.

The rest is here:
Black Lives Matter marches planned for Monday night - Daily Press

Black Lives Matter (YouTube screenshot)

Last week the National Rifle Association reposted a controversial propaganda video disguised as a recruitment ad that takes aim at the Black Lives Matter movement and uses lies in order to whip its supporters into a frenzy and encourage them to take up arms to protect themselves from a supposed enemy. Friday, a Black Lives Matter chapter in Los Angeles shot back with a video of its own.

In the video response shared with Mic, the group features families of victims of police brutality on-screen and accuses the NRA of issuing a public call to their constituents inciting violence against people who are constitutionally fighting for their lives.

We dont take that lightly. We know that we are not safe, but we are not scared, either, Funmilola Fagbamila, a member of Black Lives Matter L.A., says in the video.

The first minute of BLM L.A.s video appears to be a direct parody of the NRAs one-minute video in which spokeswoman Dana Loesch accuses an unnamed they of using their media to assassinate real news, using their schools to teach their children that their president is another Hitler, and using their movie stars and singers and comedy shows and award shows to repeat their narrative over and over again.

And then they use their ex-president, Loesch says, in a not-so-veiled reference to Barack Obama, to endorse the resistance, all to make them march. Make them protest. Make them scream racism and sexism and xenophobia and homophobia, to smash windows, burn cars, shut down interstates and airports, bully and terrorize the law-abidinguntil the only option left is for the police to do their jobs and stop the madness.

Yes, the NRA hinted that shooting protesters or otherwise hindering people from exercising their First Amendment rights is the job of the police.

In the BLM L.A. video, Fagbamila counters by saying, We will continue to produce media, teach students, march and protest to not only protect the First Amendment as fiercely as the NRA protects the Second, but to protect our lives from gun-toting racists.

Fagbamila concludes her comments with a demand that the NRA immediately remove their dangerous propaganda videos, narrated by conservative talk radio hosts Dana Loesch and Grant Stinchfield.

This is followed by images of the family members of Keith Bursey, who was killed by the Los Angeles police; Charleena Lyles, who was killed by Seattle police; and Kisha Michael, who was killed by Inglewood police. There is then a call to action, encouraging supporters to contact the NRA directly and demand that they take down the videos.

The NRA is disgusting for taking the fight for Black Lives and using it as a dog whistle to get their people worked up and up in arms. Salute to Black Lives Matter L.A. for directly speaking out against it.

Painting Black Lives Matter as a violent, racist movement is one of the laziest attacks ever, but it is also the most pervasive, because the people who support the NRA find that to be a much easier pill to swallow than admitting their own inherent and most times blatant racism against black people.

It cannot be said enough that Black Lives Matter is not an attack against anyone else; it is simply a reminder (and obviously a painful one for white people) that black humanity is still disregarded in this country.

Read more at Mic.

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Black Lives Matter LA Demands NRA Remove 'Dangerous Propaganda' Videos - The Root

REUTERS

Updated: Saturday, July 8, 2017, 10:37 AM

A police officer wounded in a shooting rampage in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, last year that left three officers dead sued Black Lives Matter movement leaders on Friday, accusing them of inciting violence that spurred the attack.

The lawsuit filed in a U.S. district court in Louisiana named DeRay McKesson and four other Black Lives Matter leaders as defendants and sought at least $75,000 in damages.

It came on the one-year anniversary of one of the deadliest days in modern U.S. history for law enforcement. On July 7, 2016, a black man angered by what he saw as deadly racial bias in U.S. policing launched a downtown Dallas sniper attack, killing five officers deployed at a protest decrying police shootings of black men.

McKesson was not immediately available for comment and Black Lives Matter leaders have denied accusations that their movement promotes violence against police.

About 10 days after the Dallas shooting, a decorated ex-U.S. Marine sergeant opened fire on police in Baton Rouge, killing three officers.

Baton Rouge had been hit by waves of protests after two police officers earlier that month killed a black man, Alton Sterling, under questionable circumstances. The incident was caught on video and sparked national debate.

The officer wounded in Baton Rouge, who was not named in the lawsuit, was shot by "a person violently protesting against police, and which violence was caused or contributed to by the leaders of and by 'BLACK LIVES MATTER'," the filing said.

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Gavin Long, the black gunman who killed the Baton Rouge officers and was later shot dead, identified himself as a member of an African-American offshoot of the anti-government, mostly white Sovereign Citizen Movement, documents showed.

Last year, McKesson and two other activists sued the Baton Rouge police department and other officials over the arrests of nearly 200 demonstrators during mostly peaceful protests over police killings.

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Baton Rouge officer injured in ambush sues Black Lives Matter ...

One year after law enforcement officers in Texas and Louisiana were ambushed by angry gunmen who said they were retaliating for high profile fatal police shootings nationwide, critics of Black Lives Matter are still trying to pin responsibility on the movement.

In a new lawsuit filed Friday, an unidentified Baton Rouge officer blamed DeRay Mckesson, Johnetta Netta Elzie and three other prominent Black Lives Matter leaders for inciting and encouraging violence at demonstrations across the country.

More specifically, it claims the movement and rhetoric of its leaders inspired a decorated ex-U. S. Marine sergeant to unleash a torrent of bullets upon Baton Rouge police on July 17, 2016, leaving three officers dead and another three injured including the plaintiff, identified only asOfficer John Doe Smith in the lawsuit.

The officer, a 42-year-old father of two who worked in law enforcement for 18 years, was left permanently disabledwhen bullets struck his abdomen, shoulder and head during the methodical ambush by 29-year-old Gavin Long at a convenience store.

Long, who was black, was killed by police in ashootout, had written in a suicide note that his actions werea necessary evil intended to create substantial change within Americas police force. He said he felt compelled to bring the same destruction that bad cops continue to inflict upon my people, upon bad cops as well as good cops in hopes that the good cops (which are the majority) will be able to stand together to enact justice and punishment against bad cops.

[Baton Rouge police assailant had searched names of officers involved in Alton Sterlings death]

The mans attack came 12 days after a different shooting in the same city, when a white Baton Rouge police officer shot and killedAlton Sterling, a 37-year-old black man, outside a convenience store. A day later, another black man, Philando Castile, was fatally shot during a traffic stop by a police officer in Falcon Heights, Minn.

Black Lives Matter protests erupted across the country, including a peaceful one on July 7 in downtown Dallas. But it turned deadly, too, when an Army veteran named Micah Johnson ambushed law enforcement officers who were overseeing the demonstration route. Five Dallas officers were killed and seven more were wounded.

Before he was killed in a standoff with police, Johnson told negotiators he was angry over the shootings that week in Louisiana and Minnesota and wanted to kill white police officers.

Ten days after Dallas, Long drove to Baton Rouge from Kansas City, Mo., and continued the bloodshed on a Sunday morning.

[One year after Dallas, NYPD ambush again sends a chill across the policing world]

The new Baton Rouge lawsuit claims that Longs ambush attack may not have happened if Black Lives Matter leaders had not incited violence among their followers, even though an exhaustive investigative report determined that Long had not attended any of the Black Lives Matter demonstrations in Baton Rouge after Sterlings death and that he believed protests were a waste of time.

Mckesson and his fellow activists were responsible for the unidentified officers injuries because they incited disdain, hatred and violence against police at protests, on social media and in news interviews, according to the lawsuit. It says Black Lives Matter seized upon the fatal police shooting of Alton Sterling by a Baton Rouge police officer to further incite its followers to take action against police.

Local news outlets reported that the description of the officers injuries match those of East Baton Rouge sheriffs deputy Nick Tullier, who nearly died in the shooting and remains hospitalized at a rehabilitation facility in Houston.

The officer has endured more than 16 abdominal surgeries and suffered extensive brain damage that has impacted his communication abilities, according to the lawsuit. He is still under constant threat of infection in his remaining wounds.

While there is no way to know how far (the officer) will progress back to normal life, he is definitely permanently disabled, the lawsuit says.

The complaint asks for at least $75,000 in damages.

This is quite a world, Mckesson told the Associated Press Friday when the publication made him aware of the lawsuit. He later told CNN that he was confident the lawsuit has no merit.Elzie declined to comment to CNN, the publication reported.

This lawsuit is the second one filed against Mckesson by a Baton Rouge police officer; both were filed by attorney Donna Grodner. In the previous lawsuit, Grodner argued on behalf of another unnamed officer that Black Lives Matter and Mckesson were responsible for injuries the officer sustained during protests that took place in Baton Rouge after Sterlings death.

Mckessons attorney asked a federal judge to throw out that lawsuit, reported the Advocate, arguing that Black Lives Matter is a social movement, not an organization, and therefore cannot be sued. The judge has not yet decided whether to dismiss the case, according to the Advocate.

Mckesson and other protesters arrested during that July demonstration in Baton Rouge later sued the city and local law enforcement agencies and they later agreed to settled, reported the Advocate. Charges were never brought against 98 of the 190 people arrested at the protests, including Mckesson.

On Sunday, another lawsuit was filed against Baton Rouge and Louisiana law enforcement agencies on behalf of 13 protesters and two reporters arrested during the demonstrations, alleging excessive use of force and civil rights violations, reported BuzzFeed News.

David Roland, the director of litigation at the Freedom Center of Missouri, told PBS News Hour that he was concerned that civil lawsuits blaming Black Lives Matter and its leaders for the actions of individuals loosely affiliated if affiliated at all with the movement could threaten the first amendment.

Its easier to dissuade protests, to chill speech, using the threat of a civil suit at least in some ways, Roland told PBS. It cant result in someone going to jail, but it can result in them being bankrupt.

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'Permanently disabled' Baton Rouge officer sues Black Lives Matter for 2016 ambush shooting - Washington Post