Cop who appeared to flash a white power 'OK sign' at a Black Lives Matter counter demonstrator is cleared by the department because they say he was checking on man who had been pushed over
An Oregon police officer was cleared of any wrongdoing after a video appeared to show him flashing a 'white power' sign during a Black Lives Matter protest on the Fourth of July.
The Department of Oregon State Police announced that it launched an investigation into the disturbing allegations after footage was shared to social media.
Video shows at least six Oregon officers in between Black Lives Matter supporters and a group of counter-protesters at a peaceful demonstration on Saturday in Salem.
The accused officer appears to walk towards a counter-protester before making an 'OK' sign - joining his left thumb and index finger while stretching out his remaining three fingers.
A counter-protester then gives the officer a congenial slap on the back.
The gesture has recently been associated with the white power movement, but Oregon police chiefs now insist that the officer was checking if the man was okay after he had apparently been pushed over in a scuffle.
The demonstrator has been accused of being a Proud Boys member on social media, but this has not been confirmed.
The videos's caption read: 'Tell me again how defund the police is wrong when no one even bats an eye at a policeman in Oregon flashing a white power sign at a Proud Boy that he’s obviously chummy with.'
The hand symbol, once harmless and typically meaning 'OK', was initially associated with 'white power' as an online joke, but has since been adopted by fringe racist figures.
'By 2019, at least some white supremacists seem to have abandoned the ironic or satiric intent behind the original trolling campaign and used the symbol as a sincere expression of white supremacy', according to The Anti-Defamation League.
An officer with The Department of Oregon State Police was accused of making a white power hand gesture during a Black Lives Matter demonstration in Salem, Oregon
Social media identified the counter-protester as a Proud Boys member, but this has not been confirmed
However, the ambiguous nature of the gesture is part of the appeal to extremists.
Joe Smothers, the 20-year-old man who captured the moment on film, told NBC News that some of the counter-protesters may have been affiliated with the hate group, Proud Boys.
'Proud Boys and the armed militia planned to disrupt the protest and have been putting out a call to arms for the past week,' said Smothers.
He added that Proud Boys members had been flashing the white power hand gesture throughout the day.
Authorities said the incident sparked after a counter-protester was shoved to the ground by another man during the demonstration
Protests against racial injustice and police brutality have sparked across the United States after the death of George Floyd and other Black Americans, including Breonna Taylor and Elijah McClain, were killed by law enforcement.
As a result, the law enforcement institution has sputtered into a crisis as Americans reexamine the role police officers have and should play when policing communities.
Footage of the alleged 'white power' incident raked in more than 2.5million views, prompting officials to open a brief investigation into the matter.
The department, which The Oregonian reports in 93 per cent white, later claimed that the 'white power' hand sign was a misunderstanding.
Authorities released officer body camera footage in an effort to disprove speculations.
They said the officer flashed the hand sign to make sure the counter-protester was okay after the fall
'The OSP Trooper identified in the video did not engage in any white supremacy behavior, implicitly or explicitly.,' the department wrote.
They said the incident began when a two men got into a scuffle during the demonstration and a counter-protester was knocked onto the ground.
The officer was allegedly checking if the assaulted man was okay and flashed the hand sign.
'An OSP trooper approached the man and asked if he was unharmed- while simultaneously displaying the hand signal commonly associated with "okay",' the department wrote.
'Best available evidence indicates the trooper was simply checking on the man's status and used the universal signal to signify this inquiry, which the man gestured he was- then patted this trooper and a second trooper on their shoulders in an apparent signal of appreciation.'
Cop who appeared to flash a white power 'OK sign' at a Black Lives Matter counter demonstrator is cleared by the department because they say he was checking on man who had been pushed over
![Cop who appeared to flash a white power 'OK sign' at a Black Lives Matter counter demonstrator is cleared by the department because they say he was checking on man who had been pushed over]()
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July 06, 2020
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