Vigil planned for Baton Rouge police at LSU

Friends and family of Jackson, 32, were mourning the 10-year veteran of the police force that relatives described as a ” gentle giant” and a ” protector” after he and another two law enforcement officers were shot and killed Sunday morning by a gunman.

The gunman has been identified as Gavin Eugene Long. Long, a black man from Kansas City, Missouri, was a Marine who was discharged as a sergeant in 2010. Police-community relations in Baton Rouge have been especially tense since Sterling’s death.

Long had legally changed his name in May 2015 to Cosmo Ausar Setepenra, according to records in Jackson County, Missouri.

The carnage in Baton Rouge rocked a city still shaken by protests over the fatal police shooting on July 5 of 37-year-old black man, Alton Sterling, who was confronted by officers while selling CDs outside a convenience store.

When the smoke cleared, six police officers had been shot, including three who died.

“We’ve been questioned for the last three or four weeks about our militarized tactics and our militarized law enforcement”, he said.

“There is no doubt whatsoever that these officers were intentionally targeted and assassinated”, Louisiana State Police Superintendent Colonel Mike Edmonson told a news conference. Of the officers who survived the shooting, one was released from the hospital Monday.

“We’re all brothers and sisters in the blue, and from Dallas, I had to come here immediately because this town is going to be crushed for a while”, Bob Ossler said.

Five Dallas law enforcement officers were killed and nine others injured on July 7 when a sniper opened fire during an anti-police brutality protest. In fact, emergency calls were made from the public, not from Long. “They were all aimed at the police officers”.

Families with children, drivers passing through and law enforcement officers from outside the area have been laying flowers and balloons or hanging crosses at a makeshift memorial in front of the B-Quick convenience store near where the officers were killed Sunday. He carried a membership card for Washitaw Nation – a black nationalist group that was once on the FBI’s radar.

Below is everything we now know about Long.

But Judge Williams said, “A mere error in judgment is not enough to show corruption”.

Long, investigators believe, meant to continue his murderous spree at the nearby police headquarters, but as he returned to the vehicle, a member of Baton Rouge’s SWAT team trained his rifle on the killer.

East Baton Rouge Sheriff Sid Gautreaux gave an update on two wounded deputies: One shot in the head and stomach remains “very critical condition”. It was followed a day later by the shooting death of another black man in Minnesota, whose girlfriend livestreamed the aftermath of his death on Facebook.