What were the locations and causes of fatalities during the 2020 protests and unrest?
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Executive summary
At least a dozen to several dozen people died in connection with the 2020 protests and unrest across many U.S. cities; early counts in June 2020 ranged from "at least 12" to "19" deaths in the immediate weeks after George Floyd’s murder, and later tallies and datasets recorded higher totals tied to the 2020–23 unrest (Forbes; Wikipedia) [1] [2]. Deaths occurred in Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Portland, Oakland, Kansas City, Indianapolis, Davenport (Iowa), Cicero (Illinois), Las Vegas and several other locations; causes included shootings by bystanders or attackers, police shootings, robberies, vehicular strikes and at least one federal security officer killed in a drive‑by attack [3] [4] [5] [6].
1. Cities where fatalities were reported — a geographically scattered pattern
Fatalities were reported in a wide range of jurisdictions rather than concentrated in a single city. Early media tallies list deaths in Minneapolis–Saint Paul (multiple deaths during the initial unrest), Oakland (a federal security officer killed), Kansas City (Marvin Francois), Indianapolis (multiple victims), Davenport, Iowa (Italia Kelly and Marquis Tousant), Cicero, Illinois (two bystanders), Las Vegas (police shooting of Jorge Gomez), Omaha (James Scurlock) and Portland among others [3] [4] [6] [5]. ACLED and major‑city reviews emphasize that violent demonstrations were a small fraction of the more than 7,700 demonstrations recorded nationally, but the fatalities themselves were spread across many locations [7].
2. Causes of death — multiple mechanisms, not one single pattern
Available reporting shows several distinct causes of death tied to the unrest: targeted or opportunistic shootings (including homicides and mass‑shooting style incidents), shootings by police or security personnel, robberies and attacks during chaos, and at least one fatal run‑over. Examples include shootings during looting or robberies in Kansas City and Indianapolis, the fatal shooting of a federal protective officer in Oakland described as a drive‑by, and people killed outside protests or ambushed while leaving demonstrations in Davenport [3] [4] [6]. Some cases initially reported as protest‑related later were judged unrelated to political motives; ACLED’s review found certain killings near protest zones were ordinary crimes occurring in the vicinity rather than politically motivated attacks [5].
3. Disputed or reclassified cases — data and motive matter
Early news counts often conflated deaths near protests with deaths caused by protests. Researchers and fact‑checkers cautioned that many fatalities initially attributed to the demonstrations were later reclassified after investigation. ACLED and PolitiFact both flagged that some deaths were crimes in the vicinity rather than consequences of political violence; ACLED’s dataset focuses on political violence and excludes many non‑political homicides reported near demonstrations [5] [8]. Media tallies therefore varied—Forbes counted at least 19 dead in a two‑week period while other outlets counted a lower number for the same timeframe—because definitions and vetting differed [3] [9].
4. Scale and context — most protests remained peaceful
Despite the deadly incidents, multiple analyses emphasize that the majority of demonstrations were peaceful: ACLED recorded over 7,750 demonstrations across more than 2,440 locations and found violent demonstrations were under 10% of locations; other crowd‑count research estimated over 96% of events involved no injuries or property damage [7] [10]. The Major Cities Chiefs Association documented thousands of protests in 68 large cities with only a minority involving violence [11]. This context matters when interpreting casualty counts: fatalities, while tragic and widely reported, occurred amid a vast national protest movement that was overwhelmingly nonviolent [7] [11].
5. Evolving tallies — short windows versus multi‑year lists
Initial mid‑June 2020 tallies—Forbes’ "14 Days" and other contemporaneous counts—focused on deaths occurring within days or weeks of Floyd’s killing and reported between about 12 and 19 deaths [1] [3]. Later research and consolidated lists extended the scope; a Wikipedia list assembled more broadly across 2020–23 records at least 42 deaths related to the broader unrest over multiple years [12]. Differences reflect scope (immediate unrest vs. multi‑year events), selection criteria (political motive required vs. any death “in relation to” protests), and post‑investigation reclassifications [3] [12] [5].
6. How reporters and analysts handled uncertainty
News organizations, academic projects and policing associations approached the casualty question differently: forensic vetting by ACLED and Major Cities Chiefs focused on political motive and incident details; immediate media reports sometimes included any death occurring near protests; fact‑checkers flagged inflated or misleading summaries [7] [11] [8]. This produced rival narratives—some emphasizing the toll and disorder, others emphasizing that most demonstrations were peaceful and that many deaths were ordinary crimes coincident with protests [7] [8].
7. What reporting does not settle
Available sources document many named fatalities and the cities where they occurred, but they do not provide a single, universally accepted list that ties every death definitively to protest motive versus proximate coincidence; ACLED’s political‑violence filter and media tallies produce different totals [5] [7] [3]. Comprehensive federal or uniformly agreed‑upon attribution of each death as “protest‑caused” is not found in the cited reporting [5] [2].
Sources cited: Forbes, The Guardian, ACLED reporting, PBS, Wikipedia lists and Major Cities Chiefs report as noted above [3] [5] [7] [6] [12] [11].