MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Protesters demonstrating against the fatal police shooting of a black man at Alabama’s largest shopping mall are trying to expand an economic boycott over the killing.
Activists went to the state capital of Montgomery on Tuesday asking supporters to quit spending money at businesses which have stores at the Birmingham-area Riverchase Galleria mall where Emantic “EJ” Bradford Jr. was killed on Thanksgiving by police who mistook him for a shooting suspect.
Participants say expanding a boycott that so far has targeted the bedroom community of Hoover will redistribute the pain from Bradford’s death.
A Hoover police officer fatally shot Bradford after mistaking him for the gunman in a mall shooting. A forensic examination released by Bradford’s family shows he was shot three times in the rear of his body.
Protests have been held almost daily since the shooting.