MODERATELY SPEAKING issued the following announcement on June 24.
The families of three people killed in Washington came together Tuesday to express anguish at their loss and to say what they think needs to be done to bring accountability and stop more deaths at the hands of law enforcement.
Initiative 940 was a particular sore spot for relatives of Shaun Fuhr, Manuel Ellis and Charleena Lyles. The initiative, passed in 2018, was supposed to bring independent investigations of law-enforcement killings and ensure communication with families of those who died.
In reality, it has not, they said.
“I don’t even know what justice is anymore,” said Katrina Johnson, a cousin of Lyles, a pregnant, mother of four who was shot seven times by Seattle officers in 2017 after she called about an attempted burglary and, police say, came at them with a knife.
Lyles may have been going through a mental-health crisis, but, her cousin said, it should not have condemned her to death.
Those who spoke at a news conference, put on by the Alaska Oregon Washington State Area Conference of the NAACP, also called for swifter investigations and prosecutions of officers, demilitarization and defunding of police, and firings of local officials they think have not made good on their promises of police accountability.
“This man is at home, and he’s not been charged,” said Jason Fuhr, referring to the Seattle police SWAT officer who in April shot Fuhr’s son in the head while he was holding his baby daughter. Police said they had received a call from a woman who said she was beaten by her boyfriend, Fuhr, who had then taken off with the child.
Original source here.
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