On May 25, 2020, Minneapolis police officers arrested George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, after a convenience store employee called 911 and told the police that Mr. Floyd had bought cigarettes with a counterfeit $20 bill. Seventeen minutes after the first squad car arrived at the scene, Mr. Floyd was unconscious and pinned beneath three police officers, showing no signs of life. The video from bystanders went viral on the Internet and sparked an international revolution.
Protesters of all backgrounds (race, age, ethnicity, country) showed up at Black Lives Matter protests for their fellow human beings. Out of love for George Floyd; Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old African-American emergency room technician who was shot multiple rounds to death by police in her apartment in Louisville, Kentucky, as she lay sleeping; and for all of the Black people who have lost their lives because of the color of their skin.
While many protests in the USA and around the world turned violent, the city of Portsmouth in New Hampshire hosted several peaceful protests sponsored by Black Lives Matter activists to support the “Black Lives Matter” cause. Thousands of protesters showed up with signs braving the COVID19, rain and heat of the early summer sun.
This photo essay is a testimonial of events covered in two USA cities, Kittery (Maine) and Portsmouth (NH). All events occurred in the month of June 2020, during the worldwide Black Lives Matter protest, while governments are still fighting to stop the spread of the COVID19.