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Amidst downtown's New Year's Eve revelry, a group of protesters chanted somberly in the cold.

"I can't breathe. I can't breathe."

Passersby rolled down their windows and gawked as a group of about 60 people on State Street and 100 South repeated the last words of Eric Garner, killed by police in New York City, and prepared to ring in 2015 with a vow to continue their fight against forceful police tactics.

"It's one of the most important things in our world right now," said protester Morgan Nelson, of Grantsville, who wore a sign stating, "If you acted like the police, you would be arrested."

"Police are absolutely out of control," Nelson said. "...They get away with everything. We need to make sure they understand, they work for us."

The group Utah Against Police Brutality, which coordinated the event, announced two "resolutions" for the new year: to seek legislation requiring an outside agency investigate each police shooting, rather than the officers' own agency; and to promote community awareness of their rights in encounters with police.

"We want to carry the struggle into 2015," said organizer Chris Manor.

Speaker Ian Oliveira asked the group to reflect on several high-profile deaths of black Americans at the hands of police in 2014.

"To be black in the United States is to have a target on your back," Oliveira said.

Pratik Raghu, a student at Westminster College, said use of force by police is an issue spilling outside American borders as the United States leads the way in introducing military equipment and tactics to police forces. He said growing up in India, he had seen "the transformation of otherwise friendly police officers into warrior cops."

Speaker Ash Davis called Utah's spate of fatal shootings by police — 14 in 2014, more than any other year in recent memory — a "really tragic reason for us all to be together on New Year's Eve." But he asked the group to keep engaging police supporters who have decried the nationwide protests that began in August after the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., and continued throughout the year.

"We are changing people's minds," Davis said. "I've had my mind changed."