Islam Times - Los Angeles protest slams police racial profiling

Islam Times - Lawyers and law students have staged a die-in protest despite rain in the US city of Los Angeles.

More than a100 demonstrators took part at the protest held outside a downtown Los Angeles courthouse on Tuesday, LA-based TV channel KTLA reported.

The protesters blocked halted traffic and blocked the walkway leading to the Hill Street entrance of the Stanley Mosk Courthouse.

They demonstrators said they protested against the US legal system that has been broken by racism.

“The issue of police brutality is not about any single officer or victim, nor is it about good people versus bad people,” Priscilla Ocen, a law professor, declared over a bullhorn. “The number of unjustified homicides is a result of an entire system left too long without the legitimate checks necessary to ensure accountability and justice.”

People in the US have been simmering with rage following the death of several unarmed black Americans at the hands of police and grand jury decisions not to indict two white police officers in Missouri and New York.

Protests have been held in the US since a grand jury decided not to indict police officer Daniel Pantaleo in Eric Garner's chokehold death in New York City and two weeks after another grand jury decided not to indict former policeman Darren Wilson in the fatal shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.

Unlike the fatal shooting of Brown, the chokehold death of Garner, a father of six and grandfather of two, was recorded by a cell phone and widely seen, contributing to the public outrage. In the video, Garner repeatedly told police officers "I can't breathe!”