ÖOn April 20, millions held their breath as they waited for a judge to read the verdict that former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was found guilty of the murder of George Floyd. About 20 minutes before the verdict Ma’Khia Bryant, a 16 year old foster child, was fatal shot by a cop a few hundred miles away in Columbus, Ohio.
According to initial reports, Bryant and two women in their early twenties were involved in the altercation, which sparked a call to the police. Body cam footage would show Bryant clutching a knife, making her the only person visibly armed until Nicholas Reardon, a 23-year-old officer who had only joined the force a year and a half earlier, arrived at the scene and fired four shots in quick succession in seconds – everyone found their target, Bryant.
“She’s just a bloody kid, man!” exclaimed a man who would later become known as Ma’Khia’s biological father and who had gathered in the driveway with other onlookers, including Jeanene Hammonds, the girls’ grandmother. Ma’Khia was taken to Mt Carmel East Hospital in critical condition and pronounced dead shortly afterwards.
While Ma’Khia’s case caught national attention, she is in fact one of several children to die at the hands of police in Ohio’s capital between 2016 and 2021 alone. During this period, five other young people were killed in similar clashes with deadly force by the police: 13-year-olds Tire king in 2016; 16 year old Julius Ervin Tate Jr and Joseph Edward Haynes in 2018; and 15 years old Abdirahman salad and 17 years old Joseph C. Jeweller III in 2020. Haynes, who was white, was the only non-black victim. data from the research cooperation Map police violence points out that since 2013, among all police departments in the United States, Columbus officials have killed their city’s youth more often than most other police forces in the country.
A mourner holds a funeral program during a service for Ma’Khia Bryant in Columbus, Ohio on April 30. Photo: Scott Olson / Getty Images
But months after the city broke out in protests for George Floyd, a combination of apathy, discomfort, and frustration led the same local lawmakers who publicly condemned the Minneapolis police to the large numbers of police murder victims in their own backyards forget. That has left the Columbus Police Department devoid of any real responsibility and, in fact, has been encouraged more than ever as the largest edition in town.
‘A rogue police force‘
The Columbus Police live streamed the body cam footage in the hours immediately following the shooting of Ma’Khia press conference, and calls it an effort for “transparency”. But the Bryant family was less than comforted. “I know what happened the night before. I know what happened the night that night of that incident and I wanted to discuss that with them before a video came out that made my granddaughter look like a monster called.
The women involved in the altercation are known today as Moore’s former foster children, who were often left unattended with the Bryant sisters while at work. Michelle Martin, the Bryant family attorney, says the women – both in their twenties – bullied and verbally abused the sisters and mocked Ma’Khia’s speech impairment. The area was so controversial that Ja’Niah Bryant called the police a month before the fatal shooting.
After an investigation by the Criminal Investigation Bureau, Ohio Attorney General David Yost finally decided, send the case to special prosecutors for review by the grand jury. Martin and Hammonds now testify to prosecutors weekly to tell the story of the threats and attacks by Angela Moore’s former foster children prior to the shooting.
Meanwhile, Ja’Niah, Martin said, has found the protests and demonstrations in support of her older sister pale from those of George Floyd last summer. “I think what people are doing is bring the situation down to the 10 seconds before Ma’Khia dies, and I think that’s not fair,” she said. “People always need a bad actor, but if they can’t see how the whole system worked together to corner them, we’re not going to get the support we need.”
The family has also considered holding a march or action to commemorate Ma’Khia with local organizers, but made no plans for fear of backlash and counter-protests. The organizational landscape in the capital has changed drastically since the summer of 2020 when, despite an escalating pandemic, protests in solidarity with George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and others increased. Dozens of protesters gathered stories of how they were terrorized by the police.
In April a woman in Columbus writes Ma’Khia Bryant’s name in chalk. Photo: Eli Hiller / Zuma Wire / Rex / Shutterstock
“The Columbus Police Department has been waging literal war in our city for weeks,” said Tammy Fournier-Alsaada, former mayor-appointed community security officer and co-founder of the People’s Justice Project. Fournier-Alsaada, among 25 other protesters, chose to file a class action lawsuit against the police for their numerous attacks on protesters, including rubber bullets, tear gas and assault.
“There is video evidence of their abuse of power in this lawsuit. If you allow someone to be in so much power and not hold them accountable, then you have renegade police. That is clearly the case here in Columbus, Ohio,” She said.
The case now on record as Alsaada versus ColumbusIt raises questions about why and how the police – unconstitutionally, says Fournier-Alsaada and others – used tear gas and other “less lethal” weapons against demonstrators.
“Cops started using tactics we had never seen in our lives – jumping out of vans, snapping people up and pointing their guns at everyone without asking questions. Even after the protests people got ghost arrest warrants – 60 to 90 days after an action, arrest warrants were issued and privately executed, and when people tried to look for you they couldn’t find where you were being taken, ”said Heather Johnson, a Activist and protester. Mind, or Phantom Warrantsthat have haunted the country in recent years are expired or erroneous arrest warrants that in most cases unknowingly remain on a person’s files.
And just weeks before she was killed four Republican-backed bills that would increase the number of detectable crimes during protests and increase penalties for crimes committed during demonstrations have been tabled and one has emerged from the House Committee. That invoice, which aims to broaden the definition of obstruction to justice to include failure to obey a lawful order or the distraction of a law enforcement officer’s attention, is of particular concern as organizers believe it enables selective enforcement and disproportionately harms black citizens will.
“It is dangerous for us to be on the streets because we are now being presented with laws that do not protect us,” said Johnson.
‘A real breakup‘
Since January 2020, eight people died at the hands of the Columbus Police Department, effectively ranking the city’s Franklin district 18th of the 100 most populous counties nationwide in its annual death toll. But local organizers and groups like it People’s Justice Project, and Columbus Police Accountability Project, have been discouraged by the lack of action on the part of state lawmakers.
After the shooting of Ma’Khia, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine, promised a major package of police reforms was on the way that said to citizens, “If this bill is passed, Ohio will be at the forefront of reform. “We’ll be able to say, ‘Look, we took it seriously,'” said DeWine.
However, with lawmakers now on summer recess, no such bill has been tabled and probably won’t be until lawmakers return this fall. Police support in 2021 stayed the largest item in the city budget at nearly $ 337 million – a slight decrease from $ 361 million in 2020 – with $ 152 million alone
Ohio state students gather to protest the April police shooting of Ma’Khia Bryant in Columbus. Photo: Kyle Robertson / AP
The Mayor of Columbus, Andrew Ginther, has persisted Spending categories such as public health and technology have also been reinforced to create a “holistic approach to public safety” and recently urged the US Department of Justice to conduct a review of the Columbus Police Department and propose reform methods. But the organizers are not convinced.
“There is a real discrepancy between what politicians say and the actions behind them,” said Jordyn Close, state coordinator at Urge: Unite for reproductive and gender equality, an intersectional organization for reproductive justice. “I think the organizers of the movement have gotten to the point where we are being offered these platitudes like community review boards and de-escalation training, but you cannot reform white supremacy in maintaining the police force and the industrial prison complex.”
At a time when there are many big cities steps Reforms, from increasing mental health services to cutting police budgets, can make organizers who have not “gone home” the lack of action and accountability not only as a missed opportunity in the wake of Ma ‘Khia’ s death, but one gross injustice.
“We must see this as a real public health crisis – that our children are literally dying on the streets and being killed by civil servants,” Martin said. “Until then, people won’t be collecting. We really need to be passionate about changing the way our world treats our children and how we respond to racial differences in our country. “
