BY JANET POST AND DALE YOUNCE

ST. PETERSBURG, Florida - TyRon Mark Lewis, an 18-year-old Black youth, was shot and killed by two white cops in south St. Petersburg, October 24, in daylight shortly after 5:00 P.M. This was the seventh police shooting in the city this year and the second fatality in about a week. On October 16 white cops shot and killed a Black man who was threatening his wife with a knife.

The police stopped Lewis's car at an intersection claiming he was speeding and, later, saying the car was stolen. When Lewis, who had a passenger, did not roll down his window, police officer Sandra Minor beat her baton on the car. Officer James Knight walked to the front of the automobile and shot Lewis five times through the windshield after he said the car "lurched forward."

Witnesses contradict this. "The car was going slow, it was just like when you take your foot off the brake," Iris Brinkley told a local reporter. Other witnesses said Lewis was getting out of the car. The passenger, also a Black youth, immediately jumped to the ground face down after the shooting.

At the scene neighbors began to gather and more cops arrived as anger over the incident grew. The St. Petersburg Times reported that children darted under crime scene tape and taunted police. Residents spoke of past shootings and shouted condemnations of police misconduct. One woman accused a Black police officer of betraying his community and dozens chanted, "Stop police brutality in the Black community." Rocks and bottles were thrown at the cops, and some cars were set ablaze. Cops threw tear gas into the crowd.

Word of the shooting spread on the south side and the angry reaction turned to general unrest throughout a 25-block area. Some 28 buildings were burned and looted, a police car was overturned, and two news vans were torched. Police reinforcements from the Florida Highway Patrol were called in. As a police helicopter lit the area with searchlights, cops used more tear gas and police dogs to break up the crowds. By the end of the night, at least 11 people had been injured and 20 arrested. There was an estimated $5 million in damage.

The next day, police chief Darrel Stephens declared a state of emergency. Florida Gov. Lawton Chiles sent in 200 National Guardsmen. That evening cops blanketed the southside, ordering angry youth off the streets. "Each car nearly overflowed with riot-equipped officers - four and five to the vehicle, the rear doors cracked open - ready to pounce at the first sign of trouble," described the October 26 Miami Herald.

South St. Petersburg, where Lewis was killed, is 95 percent Black, with 37 percent of residents below poverty level and 23 percent on government public assistance. Twenty percent of St. Petersburg's 240,000 residents are Black.

The city has a long history of police violence against the Black community and what the press describes as "race related clashes" on the southside. The Justice Department carried out an investigation in 1978 and the U.S. Civil Rights Commission reviewed "racial tensions" twice in the early 1990s. City officials established a Citizens Review Committee in 1991 to hear complaints about police conduct.

Five hundred people attended a Community Alliance meeting held two days after Lewis's death. Many angrily explained that little had improved over the years. The same day Citizen Review Committee members told the press they never heard many of the grievances being voiced and that they were "frustrated at residents who say they witnessed improper actions by police, but never came forward to complain about it."

A series of other meetings were set up by public officials to try to cool the anger and control the response. At a November 1 meeting attended by approximately 50 people, speakers included local politicians, police, ministers, community representatives, and Rev. Joseph Lowery, national president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Not once during their opening remarks did any of the speakers mention TyRon Lewis or the question of police brutality. Lowery was asked to come to St. Petersburg by Lewis's family and delivered the eulogy at his funeral.

An outpouring of 500 people attended Lewis's funeral November 2, nearly filling Bethel Metropolitan Baptist Church.

After the funeral, Lewis's cousin, 21-year-old Miguel Boyle, stated, "A lot of people don't know TyRon. But they came here today. He was shot in cold blood. What happened to him is not right. He didn't deserve to die. It makes me feel good to see so many came to pay respects."

Police officer Knight is currently suspended on paid administrative leave and Sandra Minor, who was not suspended, is working a desk job inside the police department. Federal, state, and internal police investigations are pending.

Janet Post is a member of International Association of Machinists Local 368 in Miami. Nathalia Póses, a student at Northeast High School in Ft. Lauderdale, and Maggie McCraw contributed to this article.  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home