Thousands rally in NYC, around US over officer’s conviction

Supporters in Philadelphia marched for two hours Saturday through Chinatown and around City Hall in support of 28-year-old Peter Liang in the 2014 shooting of Akai Gurley, who was unarmed. They carried signs declaring Liang’s prosecution “selective justice”. He accidentally fired one round that ricocheted off a wall in a dark stairwell and it killed Akai Gurley.

During a patrol of a public housing building in Brooklyn with his partner Shaun Landau, Liang testified that he was startled by a noise and his gun “just went off”.

His reaction caused his muscles to tense, including his trigger finger, firing a lone shot down a darkened stairwell.

Don Lee, a candidate for the NY assembly, compared Liang’s conviction to a sacrificial lamb and victim of the system. Liang faces up to 15 years in prison. She argued that Liang was clearly not a scapegoat because he was tried by a jury of his peers, and she did not approve of the protest supporting him.

Speakers at the rallies expressed sorrow over Gurley’s death but said that Liang was picked out for prosecution to satisfy political concerns over the death of black people due to police actions. Peter Liang’s sentencing is slated for April 14th.

Brown said he is making motions to have the verdict set aside. Nationwide protests are being planned this Saturday in at least 38 sites from NY to Los Angeles.