It’s getting difficult remembering all the names of the victims of police shootings, an organizer of Wednesday night’s protest in downtown Atlanta against police excessive force acknowledged.
And now, a new name: Matthew Zadok Williams, 35, who was fatally shot Monday inside his Decatur-area condominium after DeKalb police officers say he lunged at them with a knife on two separate occasions. Family members are skeptical, and their attorney, Mawuli Davis, said witness accounts differ from the official version. DeKalb police have so far declined to release body cam footage of the incident.
Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC
Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC
Though his name was invoked during the march, sponsored by an Atlanta socialist organization, around Centennial Park, details about the circumstances of Williams’ death are just surfacing and most protesters say they hadn’t heard about it. About 100 people participated in the peaceful rally, monitored, at a distance, by Atlanta police.
The demonstration was focused on Sunday’s shooting of 20-year-old Daunte Wright by Brooklyn Center, Minnesota police. The officer who fired the fatal shot meant to use her Taser instead, said Brooklyn Center’s police chief, who has since resigned. The now former-officer who fired the fatal bullet, 26-year law enforcement veteran Kim Potter, has been charged with second-degree manslaughter.
The shooting has sparked violent protests in Minnesota’s Twin Cities, where, some 10 miles away from the site of Wright’s death, the trial of Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer charged with murder for the death of George Floyd last May, continues.
Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC
Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC
Wright’s shooting was yet another inflection point that has refocused anger and attention on police shootings of African-American men, said Marla Cureton, 51, of Roswell, who attended Wednesday’s protest.
“It’s just so egregious,” said Cureton, who estimates she’s participated in at least 50 protests since last year. “This is just totally unacceptable. We have to keep protesting because silence is not an option for our community.”
Brandi Morgan, who drove from Kennesaw to attend the Atlanta rally, said she worries what might happen if Chauvin is found not guilty.
“It’s going to be really bad. There will be so much anger because it’s all on video,” said Morgan, a registered nurse. “But so was Rodney King. And a lot of other cases and the police still get away with it.”
