Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
‘He lit up a room’: Boy killed by police in Ohio recalled
Service held for man shot by Tulsa officer
COLUMBUS, Ohio — A 13-year-old Ohio boy fatally shot by a police officer investigating a report of an armed robbery was remembered at his funeral Saturday as someone with a special glow.
“He lit up a room. He demanded your attention,” said Michael Bell, who coached Tyre King on his youth football team.
Hundreds of mourners filed by a white casket draped with yellow roses at a Columbus church before a hearse carried the boy’s body to a cemetery where he was laid to rest, The Columbus Dispatch reported.
Columbus police officer Bryan Mason, a member of the department for almost 10 years, shot Tyre multiple times on Sept. 14 after the boy ran from investigators and pulled out a BB gun that looked like a real firearm, police have said.
Mason, who is white, was put on administrative leave immediately after the shooting — procedure after police shootings.
The boy’s death has inflamed tensions over the safety of blacks in Ohio’s largest city and adds to a list of killings of black males by police that are attracting national attention.
In Tulsa, Oklahoma, hundreds of mourners packed a church for a funeral honoring an unarmed black man who was fatally shot by a white police officer.
Attendees filled the Antioch Baptist Church late Saturday to remember 40-year-old Terence Crutcher, who was fatally shot Sept. 16 by officer Betty Jo Shelby.
Shelby has been charged with first-degree manslaughter, and she turned herself in Friday. She was released after posting bond.
Crutcher’s fatal shooting was captured on video taken from a police helicopter and a dashboard camera. The killing prompted several rallies and protests throughout the city in the past week, all of them peaceful.
People who attended Saturday said they hoped the service could help draw attention to future incidents involving police officers and black men.
One of the speakers at the funeral was Crutcher family attorney Damario Solomon-Simmons.
He told the crowd that “it could have been me,” before reciting the names of black residents who died after police encounters nationwide in recent years.
“Just like Terence, I’m 40; just like Terence, I’m bald; just like Terence, some think I’m a bad dude,” Simmons said.
In Columbus, attorneys for Tyre’s family have called for an independent investigation and have questioned Mason’s involvement in other shootings, including another fatality.
The head of the local police union has said Mason did what he was trained to do under the circumstances.
Evidence in the shooting investigation will be presented to a grand jury to determine whether the officer’s actions were justified or charges are warranted.
Tyre was in eighth grade, played sports and was in a young scholars program, the family’s attorneys said.
Benita Farve, pastor of the King family’s church, said during the eulogy that the community needed make changes to help a “generation of kids who are totally out of control.”
“How long are we going to let pain and anger control us? How long are we going to be the victims?” she said. “When are things going to change and we’re going to be victors?”