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Columnist recalls incident with “shocking parallels” to George Floyd killing

A veteran reporter has penned a column highlighting the “shocking parallels” between the killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis and an incident he covered early in his career, as chief reporter at the Express and Star.

David Knight, columnist and former deputy editor at the Aberdeen Press and Journal, was on the scene 20th February 1987 in Wolverhampton when Clinton McCurbin, a young black man, died of asphyxia after being apprehended by police for allegedly using a stolen credit card. 

David was prompted to write the column after he came across an archived photograph from the scene and spotted his younger-self among hundreds of other people.

In it he describes having “just arrived on the scene” to find Mr McCurbin “lying dead inside the store after allegedly being put in a stranglehold by police officers”.

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Wrote David: “I was on the edge of an ugly stand-off outside. Word had spread fast. Police relations with black communities in the region had been simmering for months.  The atmosphere was explosive.

“I glanced up and nodded to a colleague who had secured a good observation point on the upper floor of a shop next door and was staring down at me.

“I looked back quickly as a female police officer facing me was responding robustly to one of the crowd raging at her. “Suddenly a fist shot out and smashed her in the face. I was shocked and sickened.

“Somehow I dragged myself out of this hell hole in one of Wolverhampton’s busiest shopping streets as fists and batons flew.

“Parallels with the George Floyd tragedy in Minnesota have been flooding into my mind. This is why I was looking so closely at archive material on the day of Clinton McCurbin’s death, but did not expect to see myself.

“Mr Floyd was asphyxiated by a policeman’s knee, throttling him for almost nine minutes, after being arrested for allegedly using a counterfeit note.

“Clinton McCurbin was also asphyxiated in minutes. He was arrested after being accused of using a stolen credit card. The similarities were obvious, but there is a gap of 33 years between the two events.

The inquest into Mr McCurbin’s death would later rule that his death was caused by misadventure, which prompted further demonstrations and protests in the area.