Police And Negroes Dispute First Shot

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32361, 29 July 1970, Page 17

Police And Negroes Dispute First Shot

(N.Z Press Assn. —Copyright) j HOUSTON (Texas), ] July 28. i Police and black mili-! tants yesterday accused the other of firing first in a Sunday night shooting in which one person was killed and four wounded, the Associated Press reported. The police said that they did not start shooting until the militants opened fire. Negroes said that the shooting resulted from police presence at a rally earlier in the night and claimed police opened fire on an unarmed man. The militants had warned police to keep 0.. t of the area. Killed in the shooting, in which police estimated that about 100 shots were fired, was Carl Hampton, aged 21. chairman of the People’s Party 11, the black militant group that held the rally. Police said they found a shotgun where Mr Hampton fell, but a friend said that he was unarmed. A Negro who had accompanied Mr Hampton to investigate a report that armed police were on top of the church said, “We stepped

round the corner of the building and the dudes on top of the church fired and hit Carl right in the stomach. It knocked a hole as big as your fist in his stomach.” The Negro refused to identify himself, claiming that he feared police reprisals. R. G. Blaylock, who identified himself as one of the five policemen on top of the church, said that he shot an Ml carbine shoulder high at some armed men. Not In Uniform

Police said that they were armed with “personal weapons” such as shotguns, deer rifles and carbines, in addition to their regular, .45-callbre side arms. They were not in uniform. A white, a former leader of the Students for a Democratic Society, was among those wounded in the shooting in which, police said, officers on top of a church returned fire from militants in the street Two black militants and a bystander also were wounded, police said. At least one other of the militants displayed a wound which, he said, was caused by a police bullet grazing his shoulder After the shooting began round the church, police moved into the area in force.