Indianapolis: Hundreds Take to the Streets to Protest Deadly Pig Rampage

May 9, 2020 | revcom.us

 

From the evening of May 6 until early morning of May 7, Indianapolis police killed three people. 

Sean Reed—21-year-old Black man known to his family and friends as Dreasjon—was chased through the city by two unmarked cars carrying Randal Taylor, the Indianapolis police chief, and his top deputy. The two pigs claim Dreasjon was speeding and not obeying traffic signals. After a few minutes Taylor called in marked police cars to take over the chase. 

Dreasjon streamed the chase on Facebook, and many people in Indianapolis knew it was underway. When he stopped his car, the shirtless Dreasjon can be heard saying to someone, “Please, come get me!” But an unknown number of cops quickly caught up with him. Police claim Dreasjon had a gun and fired at them—there is no evidence for this, just the claims of these cops. 

About a dozen shots rang out while Dreasjon’s recorder was still running. As Dreasjon Reed lay fatally injured and bleeding to death, one of the pigs who approached him sneered, “I think it’s going to be a closed casket, homie.”

Eight hours later and two miles away, McHale Rose, a 19-year-old Black man, was shot and killed when four Indianapolis cops say they responded to a burglary call. Again, the cops claimed that they were fired on first. Chief pig Taylor claimed Rose may have tried to “ambush” the cops who gunned him down. All these claims were echoed and broadcast by the local media, with no substantiation or evidence. 

And in the hours between these murders, an Indianapolis cop ran over and killed Ashlynn Lisby, a 23-year-old white woman. Local TV reports said she was pregnant at the time of her death and described her as “struggling with homelessness.”

No cops have been charged in any of these deaths.

A Day of Righteous Anger and Protest

The next day, “unrest and anger filled the streets of Indianapolis,” as TV station RTV6 reported. People rallied and marched at the police station and through downtown Indianapolis. That night, hundreds of people took over the intersection where Dreasjon was murdered.

Taylor, who is Black, arrived and told people they would have to wait for “an investigation”—then he made the unsubstantiated claim that “there was indeed a weapon.” A friend of Dreasjon’s replied to a reporter, “The deadly force they used, that was just unacceptable! Whether he had a gun or not!” 

Jamie Reed, Dreasjon’s father, told Taylor that his son’s murder “just shows me that we’re not really being protected and served. We’re being hunted… Y’all been murdering Black people for years! What are you going to do about it?” Jazmine Reed, Dreasjon’s anguished sister, shouted at Taylor, “They shot my little brother after he was already down! He was unarmed. Ain’t no justice for that!”

This Must STOP—This System Must Be Overthrown

Racist terror perpetrated by the police and by emboldened white supremacists has been spreading like a virus across this country. It is the product of a system with deeply oppressive relations embedded in its every fiber. Protests like those in Indianapolis are righteous and must be supported. Even more, they must be transformed, and built as part of contributing to a movement aimed at making revolution and overthrowing this foul system as soon as possible.

Indianapolis, May 7, a protest vigil for 21-year-old Dreasjon Reed who recorded his murder by police on FaceBook livestream. (Photo: AP)