BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) – A year ago, Abdullah Muflahi rushed outside his convenience store, whipped out his cellphone and began taping moments before a white police officer shot and killed a black man in the parking lot.
Muflahi’s video fueled nightly protests that turned his friend, 37-year-old Alton Sterling, into another symbol of outrage over deadly police shootings. The July 5 shooting also transformed Muflahi’s store into a hub for protesters and a canvas for their grief and anger.
Visitors routinely stop by the Triple S Food Mart to photograph an iconic mural of Sterling’s smiling face on its aluminum siding. A makeshift memorial – now reduced to soggy stuffed animals and withered flowers – still stands on the table where Sterling once sold homemade CDs outside.
Little has changed in this poverty-stricken neighborhood since the shooting – a frustrating fact of life for residents and business owners who had hoped a national spotlight on their problems could erode racial divisions and improve police relations in Louisiana’s capital.
“It’s overlooked. It’s not much that the city does around here,” Muflahi said. “There are things that the city could fix and help make it better, but nobody looks at it like that.”