CNN contributor Marc Lamont Hill said Wednesday that “white supremacy” in the U.S. was at play in a New York jury’s decision not to indict a white police officer for killing 43-year-old black man Eric Garner.
“Black witness means nothing in the context of white supremacy,” Hill tweeted shortly after news broke of the non-indictment.
Hill followed up in a subsequent tweet, saying, “We watched them (police) choke this man to death. It was VIDEO TAPED. None of it matters. Black lives are disposable in this country.”
Garner died in July after an altercation with local police who attempted to arrest him for illegally selling cigarettes. A police officer placed Garner in a chokehold, which led to a heart attack. The incident was caught on video that went viral on the internet.
The non-indictment comes just days after a separate grand jury declined to indict a white police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Mo., for the shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown, who was black. The decision was met with intense rioting and unrest in the city and across the country.
