Nick Chiles, Atlanta Black Star, January 22, 2015

Over the last two months, protests against the police killing of Black men have become a global phenomenon–powerful yet peaceful demonstrations of the global community’s outrage over the seeming devaluation of Black life. But the St. Louis County Police Department is trying to fight back with images of its own, releasing another video yesterday showing more than 180 people looting a grocery story in Ferguson after the grand jury decided not to indict police officer Darren Wilson.

It’s a dramatic illustration of law enforcement attempting to subvert the emerging narrative of Black youth energized and engaged, flooding the streets of this country in demonstrative displays of their anger. The multiracial “die-ins” and marches across the country had largely erased from the public’s mind the images of riots and lawlessness that were sparked by the grand jury’s decision on Nov. 24.

But from the St. Louis police we get a reminder: They’re not politicized young people fiercely exercising their first amendment rights; they’re just criminals and thugs stealing stuff.

The video of the looters, in addition to nearly 200 images of their faces, was big news on Fox News and the Sean Hannity Show, where he interviewed the store owner.

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St. Louis County Police have released other surveillance videos in recent weeks but still haven’t made any arrests–though they claim to have positively identified six suspects from video of a gas station and a liquor store being looted.

The video released yesterday shows a huge crowd of people flooding in and out of the Dellwood Market on Chambers Road. The police also released nearly 200 pictures of looters, with arrows helpfully pointed to any faces that are visible.

Shawn McGuire, a spokesman for the St. Louis County Police Department, told USA Today the suspects identified in the video are wanted for questioning and will be taken into custody if they come into contact with police.

So it’s not enough of a priority for the police to go looking for them–they’ll be arrested if police happen to stumble across them–which is further evidence that the videos are serving a larger purpose of propagating the department’s narrative of the criminality of these Black youth.

“We really want to take the time for the public to look at each video each week,” McGuire said. “We are giving every business an opportunity for the public to help them and to help us.”

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