/ 2017 / Press / General News

Taking a Stand in Baton Rouge

  • Prize
    Silver in Press/General News
  • Photographer
    Jonathan Bachman, United States

Lone activist Ieshia Evans stands her ground while offering her hands for arrest as she is charged by riot police during a protest against police brutality outside the Baton Rouge Police Department in Louisiana, U.S.A. on July 9, 2016. Evans, a 27-year-old Pennsylvania nurse and mother to a young boy, traveled to Baton Rouge to protest the shooting of Alton Sterling.

On July 5, 2016 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Alton Sterling, a 37-year-black man and father of five, was held down by two white police officers and shot at close range by one of the officers. The shooting, captured on cell phone videos, aggravated the unrest that has coursed through the United States for two years over the use of excessive force by police, especially against black men.

Born in 1984 in Morristown, New Jersey, Jonathan Bachman studied photojournalism at Loyola University in New Orleans, Louisiana. In 2012, Bachman started photographing sporting events for the Associated Press and Reuters. In July 2016, Bachman was assigned to cover the killing of Alton Sterling, a 37-year-old black man who was shot dead by while police. It was the first demonstration Bachman ever covered. He is currently based in New Orleans as a freelance photojournalist covering sports and breaking news for Associated Press, Getty Images and Reuters.