Memphis Police Killing Highlights Tensions in Yearlong Atlanta ‘Cop City’ Protests
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As officials across the US braced for rioting this past weekend over video showing Memphis police brutally killing a Black man, Georgia set up a show of force that doubled its response to the 2020 George Floyd protests.
Republican Governor Brian Kemp issued an emergency order mobilizing up to 1,000 National Guard troops to deal with potential violence, and state police began escorting armored military vehicles into downtown Atlanta, prior to the Friday night release of videos showing the beating of Tyre Nichols by five police officers. Nichols died three days after the assault.
Georgia's outsized response was the culmination of tensions that have been building for more than a year over a planned $90 million public safety training complex in a city-owned forest south of Atlanta. Since late 2021, environmental and anti-police activists had been squatting in the forest and living in its trees to stop construction of what they call “Cop City,” a replacement for the police department’s dilapidated training facilities.
It all came to a head on Jan. 18, when protester Manuel Terán was shot and killed by a state trooper. Three days later, a protest of the 26-year-old’s killing turned violent in downtown Atlanta. To date, 11 protesters have been arrested on rare state charges of domestic terrorism.