Listen Live
WOL Featured Video
CLOSE

Mark Hughes, the man who carried an AR-15 assault rifle during last week’s Black Lives Matter protest in Dallas, was wrongly accused of being connected to the ambush on Dallas police.

After being wrongfully connected to the murder of five Dallas police officers, Hughes’s life may never be the same again. He is still receiving death threats after the Dallas Police Department cleared and released him from police custody.

Roland Martin, Host of NewsOne Now, spoke with Hughes, his brother Cory Hughes, and attorney Lee Merritt about the false accusations and his decision to carry a firearm to the protest.

Hughes told Martin the purpose for carrying the AR-15 was to “stand in solidarity with the brothers, or the cause of the protests.”

He added Philando Castile and Alton Sterling, while exercising their right to carry a firearm, “were violated just for no reason at all.”

When asked about the fundamental difference between African-Americans exercising their right to carry a gun and Whites exercising their rights, Hughes said, “There is a systematical problem that we’re not treated equally as others.”

“One group can do it and another can’t, and we should be covered under the same law, same Constitution,” said Hughes.

Hughes’ brother, Corey, who demanded Mark relinquish his rifle when the shooting started said, “We live in a country where the Constitution doesn’t work the same way for us the way it works for them.”

Dallas Police posted a photo of Mark on their Twitter account, naming him a possible suspect, and it took the DPD approximately sixteen hours to take it down after he was interviewed, interrogated, and released.

“The Dallas Police Department has never come forward and said, ‘They are no longer persons of interests, they’re no longer suspects. These guys have been exonerated,” attorney Lee Merritt said.

“The call they put out to the community to help them find them was never removed and they are still receiving death threats at their home, they’re still under constant duress and fear for their safety and the safety of their families,” he continued.

Upon their release from DPD custody, Cory said he asked Dallas Police if they would recant the message stating his brother was a suspect in the deadliest attack on law enforcement since 9/11.

According to Corey, they declined.

The Hughes brothers are now seeking an official apology from the Dallas Police Department.

Watch Roland Martin, Mark Hughes, Cory Hughes, and attorney Lee Merritt discuss DPD essentially naming Hughes as a domestic terrorist in the video clip above.

PHOTO CREDIT: Getty

Watch NewsOne Now with Roland Martin, in its new time slot on TV One.

Subscribe to the NewsOne Now Audio Podcast on iTunes.

Mark Hughes Speaks Out About Being Falsely Identified In Dallas Shootings, Says Police Declined To Recant Accusation  was originally published on newsone.com