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Fists and candles raised, demonstrators chanted Breonna Taylor’s name, their voices carrying over downtown Syracuse.

About 100 demonstrators and representatives from local activist organizations gathered in Clinton Square on Thursday night to condemn a Kentucky grand jury’s decision to not indict any Louisville police officers for shooting and killing Taylor during a no-knock raid on her home in March. Only one former Louisville detective involved in the raid is facing charges for firing shots into the apartments of Taylor’s neighbors.

The demonstrators in Clinton Square denounced a decision they said placed more value on the homes of Taylor’s neighbors than on her life.

“Not only is a disease killing us, the police are killing us, the state is killing us,” one demonstrator said. “Right now, as much as I love being Black, it’s hard to be Black.”

Representatives from several local activist groups spoke during the demonstration. The group gathered to memorialize not only Taylor but also all those in Syracuse who police have killed, they said.

Multiple demonstrators who addressed the crowd referenced Syracuse Police Department officers’ killing of Steve Smith. Sgt. Jason Wells and Officer Kenneth Sheehan shot and killed Smith during an alleged exchange of gunfire at a Sunoco on the Northside, the department has said.

SPD has not yet released body camera footage from the incident and has not commented on who shot first in the altercation that resulted in Smith’s death.

Smith’s family deserves answers, said Clifford Ryan, a local activist with OG’s Against Gun Violence.

“I don’t care if he had a gun on him or not,” a demonstrator said about Smith. “He was afraid for his life.”

Yusuf Abdul-Qadir, director of the central New York branch of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said he wants to see politicians and city leaders use their power to make substantive change. That includes enacting the People’s Agenda for Policing, a series of demands from 15 activist groups that Mayor Ben Walsh partially agreed to in July, he said.

Demonstrators specifically urged representatives on Syracuse’s Common Council to pass the Right to Know Act, legislation intended to increase transparency in SPD officers’ interactions with the public.

The law would require officers to identify themselves while interacting with the public, obtain consent to conduct unwarranted searches and record their interactions while making stops.

The Common Council has slated the act for a vote on Monday, a day that speakers at Thursday’s rally told the crowd to remember.

“What is the Right to Know Act?” Abdul-Qadir said. “What it means is you have the right to know why you’re being stopped. Why you’re being searched. Who is searching you, and where you can go to file a complaint if you aren’t being treated with respect.”

“That is the lowest of the low of what needs to be done,” he said.

Published on September 25, 2020 at 12:30 am

Contact Maggie: mehicks@syr.edu | @maggie_hickss