Update from the frontlines in Charlotte, N.C.

Charlotte, N.C. – On Nov. 30, the Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s office announced that Brentley Vinson, the pig who murdered Keith Lamont Scott on Sept. 21, won’t be indicted.

This did not surprise anyone who has been organizing to end police terror, as the capitalist state will never hold accountable the same agents who enforce its own violence. In the same fighting spirit as the day Keith Scott was murdered, but in smaller numbers, protesters hit the streets for several hours. The action was called by Charlotte Uprising, a coalition of groups fighting to end police terrorism, the same coalition that has been in the streets since the Charlotte rebellion started.

As the action began, protesters gathered on the steps of the Charlotte Metro Police Department headquarters, and speakers called attention to the cops behind us, watching us. We faced them and confronted them for their lies about their murder of Justin Carr, killed while protesting the night after Keith Scott was killed.

The big-business media painted this confrontation as a “conversation” to try to make CMPD look good. But this had nothing to do with an exchange of information. Rather, community members were publicly denouncing the police.

Protesters continued to turn up at the CMPD, then took the streets for about three hours. During the direct action, four core organizers from Charlotte Uprising were targeted and arrested, a clear repression tactic of the CMPD. Each of the four freedom fighters was trans or gender nonconforming, reflecting the fact that most of the central organizers of Charlotte Uprising are trans/GNC. All freedom fighters were out of jail by the next day.

In the recent release of the autopsy of Justin Carr, no gunpowder residue was found on Justin’s skin, though the CMPD’s story alleged another protester murdered him with a handgun. The people have been saying the whole time that a rubber bullet, fired by police, killed Justin, and the evidence exposed the cop lie.

Many community members believe that a white pig, and not Brentley Vinson, who is Black, murdered Keith Lamont Scott. However, the Mecklenburg County DA’s office certainly did not make their decision not to indict based on absolving an individual cop, but on absolving the entire police force of any blame for enforcing white supremacy.

As Charlotte saw last year with the mistrial of killer cop Wes Kerrick, an indictment probably wouldn’t have led to a conviction. It certainly wouldn’t have addressed the fundamental system of capitalism that is to blame for Keith Scott’s murder. It would have given Scott’s family something to materially hold onto, but once again the state refuses to give dignity to the people or validity to the people’s justice.

The Charlotte Uprising has been one spontaneous struggle, one of many, to show that this racist capitalist system must be overthrown.