*WARNING: GRAPHIC VIDEO*
Only a day after the shooting death of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge incited national protests, a second killing at the hands of a police officer became the center of outrage out of Falcon Heights, Minnesota. In a video streamed to Facebook Live, 32-year-old Philando Castile is seen losing consciousness in the passenger seat of his car as his girlfriend, driver Lavish Reynolds broadcasts the moments after gunfire went off. “Please, officer, don’t tell me he’s gone; please don’t tell me that you did this to him. You shot four bullets into him, sir,” Reynolds tells viewers witnessing Castile slumped over to his side in a blood soaked t-shirt.
A police report would confirm that the shooting occurred at a traffic stop at around 9 p.m. on Wednesday, July 6. While the report read of a gun being recovered at the scene, no further detail was given about the weapon. Reynolds admits to Castile possessing the firearm as she recounts him disclosing that he was armed with a license to carry as he motioned for his license and registration, at the officer's request. The actual shooting was not recorded, but according to Reynolds the officer began firing as he reached for his wallet. “I told him to get his hand out; I told him not to reach for it,” the officer is heard screaming with his gun drawn outside of the passenger window. Reynolds' 4-year-old daughter can be heard crying in the back seat.
Castile, a St. Paul schools employee of twelve years, would be rushed to Hennepin County Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 9:37 p.m. Hours after his passing a parent at the school in which Castile served as a cafeteria worker posted a tribute to him on Facebook. By the early morning hours of July 7 a vigil had been propped up at the scene, and several hundred protesters began amassing outside of the governor's mansion. Castile's family was joined at the hospital by a pastor and the local NAACP president.
Source: heavy.com
