On the morning of July 24, 1973, in Dallas, Texas, 30-year-old Dallas Police Officer Darrell L. Cain fatally shot Santos Rodriguez, a 12-year-old Mexican-American child.
Officer Cain and Officer Roy R. Arnold were investigating reports of a burglary at a Fina gas station when they took Santos Rodriguez and his 13-year-old brother David Rodriguez from their home for an impromptu interrogation over the burglary. Eight dollars in change had been taken in the burglary.
Cain shot Santos Rodriguez while conducting Russian roulette on the brothers in an attempt to force a confession from them.
Cain was found guilty of murder with malice, and was sentenced to five years in prison. He was released on September 11, 1979, after serving the minimum two-and-a-half-year sentence.
A march, held on July 28 and called the “March of Justice for Santos Rodriguez”, was led by community leaders and organizations, including Rev. Sanchez, Councilman Pete Aguirre, Rene Martinez, Florentino Ramirez, State Representative Sam Hudson, and members of the Brown Berets. Marchers were predominantly of Mexican-American and African-American descent.
Speeches were made at the steps of City Hall calling for community unity and action, and at around 12:50 pm the march led back to Kennedy Plaza. Prayers were held at the plaza and the original organized march was dispersed.
Afterwards, groups broke off from the march and latecomers joined the groups as they headed back towards City Hall. Officers in gas masks and armed with clubs confronted the crowd, and the crowd dispersed as some of its members damaged nearby stores.
The crowd became agitated and damaged storefronts and started looting.
At City Hall, leaders of the original march such as Councilman Aguirre and Representative Hudson got on top of a Dallas Police car and used the speaker system in an attempt to get the crowd under control. Dallas Police vehicles were damaged by the crowd, and a motorcycle was burned. Police officers experienced some physical attacks, with five officers injured, but there were no serious injuries.
Leaders of the march later expressed dismay over the chaotic situation, but applauded the purpose of the march and its original organization.
