Zachary Packard Injured - at the 2020 George Floyd Protests in Denver, CO
My most important photos - to date
I’m sure that you know this, but:
In 2020, the ordinary dude George Floyd was murdered by the racist coward Derek Chauvin.
That piece-of-shit cop white supremacist's decision to brutally murder an innocent black dude, proved to be finally enough impetus to push the tired and oppressed population of the USA into standing up, again.
”Enough of the racism” “Enough of the violence” “Enough of the oppression” “Enough of this police unaccountability” “Enough of this white superiority bull-shit” “Enough of black people being murdered by the police”; these were but few of the the calls of the masses.
Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions? The people of the United States gathered in the streets, and all together and collectively; shouted “This is some bull-shit!”
I cannot try to truly explain, exemplify or praise the true greatness and importance of the 2020 George Floyd Protests. It was too big, too important, too critical for just a lowly photographer like me to try to explain. That power is beyond my words.
That is not what I am trying to do here today.
What I am trying to do is to share the photos of a specific incident that happened during the 2020 George Floyd Protests.
These photo’s of a person named Zachary Packard.
On May 31, 2020, at approximately 9:13 pm Mountain Time, near Colfax and Washington Street in Denver, Colorado; a protester named Zachary Packard was struck in the head by a lead-filled bean-bag round fired from at shotgun by an Aurora Colorado Police Officer.
He was rendered unconscious, suffered a fractured skull and jaw, two fractured spinal discs, and had bleeding in his brain.
He was hospitalized due to his injuries.
His case lead to a successful mulit-million dollar lawsuit against…
…. mores details to come. I’m still doing the PTSD sorry…
The photograph sequence below show the immediate before, during, and after Zack Packard was hit in the head with the shotgun round.
These 12 frames were taken over approximately 1.9 seconds.
These photos are original, they have not been edited, modified, changed, or falsified in any way which reduces their accuracy to real-life*
*These images have been downscaled to 4k dimensions. These images have had a water-mark added to them.
I have not edited these photos. No re-touching, altering, AI modification, AI enhancement, or any other digital-trickery has been added to these photos.
These images are as close to straight-out-of-camera RAW as I could get.
Technical details:
Canon EOS 80D Camera
Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM Lens
Aperture f2.8
Shutter speed 1/250 - 1/400
ISO 6400 - 12800
All photos are by me: Travis R Vowell
Taken on May 31, 2020.
All images are copyright by me: Travis Vowell TRVowell Photo copyright
Do not steal without permission
On a personal note:I do not remember taking these photos. That night is a blur at best.I remember being out there. I remember taking some photo’s, but I do not remember this.I do not remember Zack being shot, or falling to the ground unconscious.I do regret that I did not see him in distress, and that I did not help him. I wish that I was paying more attention. I should have helped him.To this day, not helping Zack in his time-of-need is one of my biggest regrets and failures.That night I was tear-gassed, shot with a 37mm or 40mm foam baton round, and shot about 10-12 times with pepper-ball rounds.I was arrested that night, less than half-an-hour after taking these photos. I was tackled, zip-cuffed, shoved into a patty-wagon; denied food, water, bathroom and a phone call for over 6 hours; and held in jail for over 50 hours.All for taking photographs.The bogus charges were eventually dropped.But this is nothing compared to the abuse and hardships that thousands of black and POC Americans face on an every-single-day basis ….———- more to come, ppsd and all. will update soon
Copyright © Travis Ryan Vowell (Travis Vowell) · TRVowell Photo, Denver, Colorado. All rights reserved. Unless otherwise credited, all photographs and original essays on this page were created by Travis Ryan Vowell and are owned by him. Reproduction, republication, or commercial use requires prior written permission, except as permitted by law. Copyright © travis@trvowellphoto.com - Copyright © Travis R Vowell - Copyright © TRVowell Photo - Denver, Colorado, USA, Earth
All photos are taken, edited, posted, and published by me: Travis Ryan Vowell
These are my photos. I took them.