Race riots usually begin with criminality and end with criminality. They're protests by criminals on behalf of a dead criminal. The stores with smashed windows aren't a means of expressing outrage, but the end. The purpose of criminality is criminality. The police exist so that stores can remain unrobbed and random pedestrians can remain unbeaten. The protests express opposition to that policy by robbing stores and assaulting random people. Riots and looting are not a distraction from the protests. They are the essential point of the protests and the radical movement that they represent.
The police were never the problem. The looters and rioters were.