Floyd’s death last year sparked protests both peaceful and violent in hundreds of cities and ignited a new civil rights movement focused on exposing systemic racism and pushing for police reform.
Since then calls for change have only become more strident given the growing list of people of color killed while interacting with law enforcement. They include Rayshard Brooks, killed last June in Atlanta, and in recent days Daunte Wright, 20, shot
in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, and Adam Toledo, 13, shot by a Chicago police officer while raising his hands at the officer’s request.
Over the past years, many such incidents have resulted in settlements or no charges brought against the officers involved, further inflaming tensions in communities of color and cementing a feeling that justice – even in the case where a video of an incident was available – would be hard to come by despite the world having watched the nearly 10-minute video of Floyd dying under Chauvin s knee.