The father of one of five officers killed during the shooting downtown Dallas this past summer is suing Black Lives Matter for the death of his son.
Enrique Zamarripa, father of Dallas police Officer Patrick Zamarripa, on Monday filed a lawsuit in a U.S. District Court in Texas. He is seeking damages of up to $550 million.
According to the suit, he blames the BLM national organization and other defendants like the Nation of Islam, Reverend Al Sharpton, the New Black Panthers Party and activist DeRay McKesson in the deadly ambush.
And what is the basis of his suit? He claims that the perpetrator Micah Johnson shot at officers due to the defendants’ anti-police rhetoric “that there is a civil war between blacks and law enforcement, thereby calling for immediate violence and severe bodily injury or death,” according to ABC.
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The officers were killed after the July protest organized by Dallas-based Next Generation Action Network, which is not directly affiliated with Black Lives Matter. Generation Action Network was not named in the suit, but the organization president Dominique Alexander does not think a lawsuit will solve underlying issues in the community.
Interestingly enough, Patrick Zamarripa’s mother, Valerie Zamarripa, issued a statement Tuesday saying that she was not part of her ex-husband’s lawsuit.
This is not the first type of suit aimed at the BLM movement. In September, Dallas police sergeant Demetrick Pennie filed a federal lawsuit against Black Lives Matter, blaming it for race riots and violence against officers.