Students, Community Members Hold Vigil
for Deloatch
Upwards of 50 people gathered at Feaster Park
Sunday to hold a vigil for slain New Brunswick man Barry Deloatch, and Florida
teenager Trayvon Martin.
Candle flames stayed lit amid the falling rain
Sunday, as upwards of 70 protesters and community members gathered for a vigil
to commemorate the death of Barry Deloatch, speak out against police violence
and reflect on other, more recent police-related deaths throughout the country.
The vigil was held at the corner of Throop
Avenue and Handy Street, the location where Deloatch was shot and killed last
September by city police officers. Among those present were representatives of
the NAACP, The New Black Panther Party, Occupy New Brunswick, New Labor and
others.
Tormel Pittman, who was responsible for
leading many of the anti-police brutality protests in the city since the death
of Deloatch, said people must remain vigilant and aware of the things happening
around them.
“We’re all here for Barry Deloatch, we’re all
here for Trayvon Martin, and we’re going to stay here,” Pittman said through
his microphone as he addressed the crowd. “The only way what happens to us will
stop is if we stop it. If you’re going to kick your feet back and allow some
divine intervention to take place, you’re going to be waiting for a long time.”
Pittman informed the crowd about the Grand
Jury proceeding regarding the police officers involved in the shooting of
Deloatch.
“The grand jury has been presiding for about
four weeks, and there hasn’t been too much media coverage on that situation,”
he said. “We want to let the community know that they [the prosecutors] are
presenting the case to the grand jury as we speak.”
Along with Deloatch, participants discussed
Victor Rodriguez, a city resident who was paralyzed from the waist down after
being shot by city police in January, 18-year-old Ramarley Graham, an unarmed
teen shot by NYPD in February, and the recent shooting of 17-year-old Florida
teen Trayvon Martin.
New Labor Executive Director Marien Casilla
Pabellon said the message is clear and consistent — city residents are not
going back and are not backing down from police violence.
“This is not about what they are doing to us,”
she said. “It’s about what we are going to do to them if they keep doing this.
It’s not about if they’re going to keep criminalizing our communities. It’s not
about if they’re going to continue profiling [us]. It’s not about if they’re
going to give power to the police or act as immigration officers.”
Zayid Muhammad, of the New Black Panther
Party, said much of the aggression being put forth now to regulate police
misconduct are bi-products and continuations of the black power and civil
rights movement’s of the 1960s, and encouraged everyone to keep protesting.
“We must continue to raise our voices,” he
said. “We must continue to raise the volume. We must continue to raise hell. We
must continue to bum rush the show.”
Had enough? Write to the Speaker of the House, U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, DC 20515 and demand federal
hearings into the police problem in America.
Demand mandatory body cameras for cops, one strike rule on abuse, and a
permanent DOJ office on Police
Misconduct.