‘Release the tape.’ Protesters demand video of fatal Biloxi courthouse shooting by deputy
Standing near the spot where Reginald Johnson was shot and killed by a Harrison County deputy 11 days ago, about 50 protesters said Tuesday afternoon that they only want the truth.
Johnson, 48, was killed outside the county courthouse in Biloxi on Jan. 15. Since then, investigators have released few details about what led to his death.
Johnson’s family has asked for video footage so they can understand what happened in their his final moments.
On Tuesday, protesters, including many of Johnson’s friends as well as Coast activists who never knew him, threw their support behind that demand.
“They took a life that meant a lot to a lot of people in our community,” said Leslie Walker, 37. “He has family that loved him. They deserve [to see the video]. Every family deserves it.”
Walker said Johnson was a near-constant presence for her growing up in East Biloxi, and he was a familiar face and friend to countless others in the neighborhood. That was why his killing was so painful, and why the lack of clear answers so troubling. Many of the people in the crowd Tuesday afternoon were Johnson’s friends from growing up and spending his life in East Biloxi.
Demonstrators stood on the sidewalk outside the courthouse on Lameuse Street, chanting “No justice, no peace” and “Release that tape.”
“As the people who pay these people’s salary, we have the right to see this video,” said D’Laun Ball, the protest organizer and founder of the organization Protest for Peace.
Garland Andrews, a longtime friend of Johnson’s, said he was prepared to accept that his friend had been in the wrong, and that the officer who killed him had feared for his life. But right now, he said, “all we got to go off is assumptions.”
“The not knowing is the hard part,” Andrews said.
Walker said that without more information from law enforcement, it was hard not to see the killing of Johnson, who was Black, as a lethal injustice like those that took the lives of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd.
“How do they think we’re going to look at it?” she said. “We’re going to look at it as a racial issue.”
A lack of outreach from law enforcement
The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation made its first public statement on the case last week, saying that prior to the shooting, Johnson “displayed a knife and began to advance on the deputy. The deputy discharged his service weapon striking Johnson who was pronounced dead on scene.”
Johnson’s sister, Deaundra West, said at the protest Tuesday that MBI had reached out to her family for the first time on Monday night, 10 days after her brother was killed. An MBI official called her around 7 p.m. and told her only that MBI was investigating her brother’s shooting.
West said she still doesn’t understand why it had taken so long for law enforcement to get in touch with her family, given that Harrison County Coroner Brian Switzer had contact information for her and her mother. The lack of information has made her family feel like something is being hidden, she said.
“I feel like with all that’s going on in the world, just like the police want to be protected, we want to be protected,” she said. “Just like we have to prove our innocence, they have to prove their innocence.”
National experts on policing and prosecution say it is important for law enforcement to reach out to the families of people killed by officers. A “toolkit” for prosecutors and communities dealing with officer-involved fatalities, produced by the Institute for Innovation in Prosecution at John Jay College of Criminal Justice with input from law enforcement and citizens from around the country, recommends a local prosecutor “connect with family impacted by incident” within 24 hours of a fatality.
“Families who lose loved ones to police are often kept in the dark as the investigation unfolds, and kept at arm’s length throughout the process, sowing mistrust and undermining the perceived legitimacy of the investigation,” said Michael Kahn, director of the Institute for Innovation in Prosecution.
“By connecting with the family at an early stage, even just to explain the process and provide transparent information about next steps and timelines, the prosecutor can empower the victim’s family and provide them with information about relevant services,” he said.
The toolkit also recommends investigators provide updates to family before releasing information to the media. West and her family learned of MBI’s statement last week only when it was distributed to media outlets.
Release of footage a rarity in South Mississippi police shootings
It is rare for South Mississippi law enforcement agencies to release video footage of fatal shootings by their officers. In 2019, the Moss Point Police Department released body camera footage of the fatal shooting of Touissant Diamon Simms after the Sun Herald requested it.
In 2006, the fatal beating of Jessie Lee Williams at the Harrison County Adult Detention Center was captured on camera, and that footage became evidence in the trial of several officers involved.
But elsewhere in the country, police departments have moved more quickly to share footage with the families of people killed by their officers.
In Philadelphia, the family of Walter Wallace Jr. was allowed to review police body camera footage just three days after he was shot and killed by police in October 2020. (Wallace was experiencing a psychological episode and carrying a knife, but his family says he was not advancing toward the officers.)
The toolkit also says that best practices require investigators to “meet standards of transparency, i.e. release video footage within 10 days.”
A memorial service for RJ
On Saturday, family and friends gathered in Doris C. Busch Park in East Biloxi to pay tribute to Reginald Johnson, whom people often called RJ.
In the crowd were some of Johnson’s friends from the 1989 and 1990 state championship-winning Biloxi High basketball team, for which he served as manager.
Others wore T-shirts or sweatshirts that read “The Untouchables, est. 1989.” That was the name a group of Johnson’s friends chose for themselves, after the 1987 movie, when they were teenagers. Back then, Busch Park was their regular meeting place. They’d hang out there before moving on to John Henry Beck Park or to a party elsewhere on the Coast, said Marcus Lashley, 48.
“We always put on on for Biloxi,” Lashley said.
As they got older, they saw each other less frequently. Hurricane Katrina transformed East Biloxi and scattered some of The Untouchables. In the past few years, several members of the group have passed away.
“Unfortunately, most of the time I see people, it’s like this,” said Bo Watson, 52.
The Untouchables were planning a reunion for Saturday, Jan. 16. They would grill and drink beer under the pavilion at Busch Park, catching up about their lives. The day before the reunion, Johnson was shot and killed.
This story was originally published January 26, 2021 at 6:57 PM.
