40 protest over grand jury decision in favor of Canton police officer
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CANTON ‒ A Stark County grand jury’s decision not to indict city police officer Robert Huber for the shooting death of James Williams prompted a crowd of at least 40 people to loudly protest Wednesday evening in Central Plaza.
Coordinating through a Facebook page, the first protesters appeared at City Hall within an hour of the 4 p.m. press conference announcing the grand jury’s decision against criminal charges.
Canton resident Skylark Bruce said she was absolutely outraged, calling it a “horrendous day for justice in Canton, Ohio.”
More: A timeline of the shootingHere’s what led up to James Williams’ shooting and death and what has happened since.
More: No chargesCounty grand jury votes against criminal charges against police officer Robert Huber.
“This is utter nonsense,” she said. “This is murder, point blank, by a Canton city cop and the cop got away with it and that is not OK in this century. … There’s just no words for how much this is devastating.”
The demonstration moved to Central Plaza at about 5:30 p.m. and the group gradually grew.
More:New Year’s Day shooting victim remembered at vigil
Jolanda Jackson, accompanied by some of her children, led many of the chants.
“No justice, no peace! No justice, no peace!” she yelled. “Honk your horn for justice! Honk your horn for change!”
Jackson said she was collecting signatures to place a proposed state constitutional amendment on the ballot next year that would abolish qualified immunity for public officials and public employees, including police officers.
James Williams’ family attends protest
Marquetta Williams, James Williams’ widow, took part in the demonstration. She declined to comment.
“I can’t give a statement today,” she said. “But at another time I will be releasing a statement.”
Jason Cousins, 51, of Akron, said he was skeptical a Stark County grand jury could be objective because Stark County grand juries had not kept police officers accountable in the past “for abusive behavior toward Black people.” He said the system is corrupt. He said a grand jury convened in Columbus or somewhere outside the county should have handled the case.
“There was no way a grand jury here was going to find an officer guilty,” Cousins said, adding that Huber failing to identify himself as a police officer before shooting makes him criminally liable.
Kelly Williams, 46, the chairman of Stark County Re-entry, joined the protest after leaving a work meeting.
“It’s very surprising that (the police officer) is not going to be tried,” he said, adding that if the police officer feared for his life, he wouldn’t have run toward Williams behind the fence. “It was straight murder, period.”
One of the rally organizers, Sierra Mason of Canton, said, “Honest to God, I’m pissed. Like genuinely raging about the decision because it’s absolutely unacceptable … The community is clearly not going to stand for this and we’re going to continue to fight for the Williams family.”
Grand jury secrecy
Moniquec Conner, vice president of the Stark County NAACP, said at the event about the grand jury decision, “I think it was very biased and secretive. You know this is a public case. All the secrecy, that gave me hesitation from the start. But I just have no faith in our justice system. … We’re still at Square One. This is not a black and white issue. This is a justice issue. There’s no justice. There’s no justice in this.”
She said at the very least the city, which has denied wrongdoing in its legal response to the family’s federal lawsuit, could have fired Huber.
The department has said it will conduct an internal review after the end of the criminal case. By law, much of the grand jury’s review of evidence is secret.
The event seemed to be winding down around 7:20 p.m. But then four police officers appeared in separate vehicles and issued a citation to a protester for blocking a lane of southbound Market Avenue with her parked minivan. This riled up the demonstrators who increased the cadence and volume of their chants.
Reinforcements
Shortly before 8:30 p.m., the crowd more than doubled in size to about 40 as a contingent of honking motorists drove through Central Plaza. They parked in the parking lot by Bender’s and joined the extremely loud protest.
After being cited, the protester in the minivan, who identified herself as Madonna and declined to give her legal name, drove up and down Market Avenue, continuously honking her horn as as she waved a “Black Lives Matter” flag outside her vehicle’s window.
“They should have left me alone,” she said to a reporter about the police officers who cited her. “Now I’m noisy.”
Reach Robert at ro*********@ca*******.com. Twitter: @rwangREP.
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