The parents of Michael Brown, the teenager shot dead by a policeman, have called the account given by the officer who shot him unbelievable.
Mr Brown’s family said the comments from Darren Wilson added "insult after injury".
Protests have flared across the United States after Monday's decision by a grand jury not to prosecute the white police officer for shooting dead the unarmed black teenager in Ferguson, Missouri.
In his first televised interview since the incident, Mr Wilson said he feared for his life in the incident in August.
He told ABC News that Mr Brown resembled an angry "demon" and had started the confrontation, grabbing for his gun and later rushing toward him.
Mr Brown's mother Lesley McSpadden, visibly emotional in an interview on NBC's Today show, said the officer's remarks added "insult after injury," and were "so disrespectful".
In a separate interview on CBS This Morning she said: "I don't believe a word of it.
"I know my son far too well to ... he would never do anything like that.
"He would never provoke anyone to do anything to him and he wouldn't do anything to anybody.
"I don't believe a word of it. Our son doesn't have a history of violence."
His father, Michael Brown Sr, said on NBC he felt the officer's version of events was "crazy".
"For one, my son, he respected law enforcement," he said.
"Two, who in their right mind would rush or charge at a police officer that has his gun drawn? It sounds crazy."
The parents' lawyer also rejected Mr Wilson's description of Mr Brown.
"When you have people of colour be killed they try to demonise and play on the stereotypes, and they try to put the police officer who killed our children on a pedestal," Benjamin Crump told NBC.
"It's just not right, and we have to fix this system."
Mr Brown's death, the aggressive police response to protests and now the result of the grand jury hearing have stirred racial tensions in Ferguson, a mainly black suburb with a mostly white police force, and across the United States.
Elsewhere, thousands protested in London tonight in sympathy with demonstrations across the US over the killing of Mr Brown.
About 5,000 protesters held signs reading "Black lives matter" and chanted "Hands up, don't shoot", the slogan adopted by protesters in the US.
At a rally outside the United States embassy, relatives of black men killed by police in Britain addressed the crowd.
Some protesters carried candles, and a minute of silence was held in honour of those killed by police around the world.
