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Pro Athletes Join Eric Garner Protests

Pro Athletes Join Eric Garner Protests

This weekend, several high-profile athletes made their own statements, joining nationwide demonstrators protesting a grand jury’s decision not to indict police officers in the chokehold death of unarmed, black Staten Island resident Eric Garner. Before an NBA game Saturday evening in Chicago, Bull superstar guard Derrick Rose wore a T-Shirt in warm-ups that read “I Can’t Breathe.” In a video of Garner’s encounter with police, he could be heard pleading with officers, uttering the phrase nearly a dozen times.

On Sunday, NFL stars including the Lions’ Reggie Bush, the Browns’ Johnson Bademosi and the Rams’ Davin Joseph wore the same message on warm-up shirts or cleats. The protests come a week after five St Louis players raised their hands in the “Hands up, don’t shoot” gesture before a game, sparking an awkward public relations back-and-forth between team officials and local police. The death of Eric Garner, and the lack of an indictment against officers involved, has sparked nationwide protests and comes on the heals of several other incidents in which white police officers have killed unarmed black men …

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