to the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) and Williams' book Negroes with Guns, Newton decided to organize patrols to follow the police around to monitor for incidents of brutality. But with a crucial difference: his patrols would carry loaded guns. Black Panther Party members were involved in many fatal firefights with police. Huey Newton allegedly killed officer John Frey in 1967, and Eldridge Cleaver led an ambush, in which two officers were wounded and Panther Bobby Hutton was killed. In 1969, the FBI developed an extensive counterintelligence program (COINTELPRO) of surveillance, infiltration police harassment, and many other tactics, designed to undermine Panther leadership, incriminate and assassinate party members. The program was responsible for the assassination of Fred Hampton and is accused of assassinating other Black Panther members, including Mark Clark.

The Black Panther Party first publicized its original "What We Want Now!" Ten-Point program on May 15, 1967
1) We want freedom. We want the power to determine the destiny of our Black Community.
2) We want full employment for our people.
3) We want an end to the robbery by the Capitalists of our Black Community.
4) We want decent housing, fit for the shelter of human beings.
5) We want education for our people that exposes the true nature of this decadent American society. We want an education that teaches us our true history and our role in present-day society.
6) We want all Black men to be exempt from military service.
7) We want an immediate end to POLICE BRUTALITY and MURDER of Black people.
8) We want freedom for all Black men held in federal, state, county, and city prisons and jails.
9) We want all Black people when brought to trial to be tried in court by a jury of their peer group or people from their Black Communities, as defined by the Constitution of the United States.
10) We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice, and peace.