Making people uncomfortable in U.S. can get you killed: NYT

People lay flowers and candles to mourn Jordan Neely in New York, the United States, May 6, 2023. (Photo by Michael Nagle/Xinhua)

All of these innocent people who lost their lives were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

NEW YORK, May 7 (Xinhua) -- Increasingly, it is not safe or even may cost one's life to be in public, to be human, to be fallible in the United States, said an opinion piece The New York Times (NYT) published on Thursday.

In Kansas City, Missouri, Ralph Yarl, a Black 16-year-old, got shot twice after ringing a wrong doorbell. In upstate New York, the 20-year-old woman Kaylin Gillis got shot and killed by a homeowner after driving into a driveway.

In Illinois, William Martys got killed by his neighbor when he was using a leaf blower in his yard. Two cheerleaders were shot in a Texas parking lot after one of them got into a wrong car. And on Monday, Jordan Neely, a Michael Jackson impersonator experiencing homelessness, was chokeheld to death by a white man for yelling on subway train.

"All of these innocent people who lost their lives were in the wrong place at the wrong time," said the opinion piece. "In most cases, armed assailants deputized themselves to stand their ground or enforce justice for a petty crime. Some claimed self-defense, said they were afraid, though some of their victims were unarmed women and children."

The United States is "at something of an impasse," said the article. "The list of things that can get you killed in public is expanding every single day. Whether it's mass shootings or police brutality or random acts of violence, it only takes running into one scared man to have the worst and likely last day of your life."