KENOSHA, Wis. (AP) — A Black man, accosted by police on a domestic dispute call, is left with bullet wounds in his back that will likely keep him from ever walking again. A white 17-year-old, rifle in hand, strolls past authorities untouched amid cries that he just gunned down three people protesting the Black man’s shooting.
Two moments of bloodshed, two days and 2 miles apart in Kenosha, Wisconsin. And in those two moments, this mid-sized Midwestern city seemed a stark microcosm of a nation wracked by discord over racial inequity, policing and the meaning of public safety.
The chain of events that began Aug. 23 with Jacob Blake’s shooting has become a disputed X-ray of a divided society -- a black-and-white picture where some see racial injustice that proves the urgency of the Black Lives Matter movement, while others see rioting that spurred a teenager to try to defend a community against chaos.
