On the second anniversary of Jayland Walker’s killing by Akron police officers, Signal Akron reached out to a number of Black residents in the city to reflect on the somber occasion.
We asked them what had changed in two years and what still needs to, as well as whether they were optimistic or pessimistic about residents’ relationship with police now. Their answers were thoughtful and wide-ranging.
Stephen Muhammad: ‘You’re not powerless’
Two years after Jayland Walker was killed, Stephen Muhammad thinks a lot has changed — and a lot still needs to.
Muhammad, a Nation of Islam minister with Muhammad Mosque No. 37, off Copley Road, said he thinks the political shifts in the city stem from Walker’s death.
The police killing and its aftermath were likely the catalyst for then-Mayor Dan Horrigan to decline to seek another term, Muhammad said, paving the way for Shammas Malik’s election. Muhammad said he’s optimistic about the new approach Malik brings to the city, including efforts to hire a more diverse police force. He called Malik “hands on in a way I’ve never seen a mayor hands on.”
“I think Mayor Malik is one of the best things that Akron has seen in quite some time,” he said.
Muhammad called Walker’s death “one of the breaking points” that opened the door for Malik to come in “and some new things to come in with him: new ideas, new approach, new framework.”
But the undercurrent of gun violence remains, Muhammad said, underlined by incidents such as the mass shooting June 2 that killed one person and injured 27. He said guns continue to be an issue, but one that can’t be solved quickly.
An alliance of religious leaders is working toward reducing violence in the city by helping create more avenues for people to discuss their problems instead of trying to solve them with guns. Muhammad said Akron is “chock full of brilliant people” and he’s confident that people can come together to heal.
“There’s no reason the mayor should have to sit on this and figure it out. It’s not his responsibility, only,” Muhammad said. “And there’s not going to be a police chief who’s going to come and resolve this. … My desire is to help people see, you’re not powerless.”
Robert DeJournett: ‘We will never get over this’
Robert DeJournett does not want another family to have to deal with the shock and grief that accompany a police shooting.
Jayland Walker was DeJournett’s nephew. While many people have moved on from the raw emotions of Walker’s killing on the second anniversary of his death, the trauma lingers, said the senior pastor of St. Ashworth Temple, Church of God in Christ.
“The family, we will never get over this,” he said. “The sting of it is just as intense for the family. Every day. They think about this every day.”
DeJournett said the creation of the Citizens’ Police Oversight Board and changes to the police department’s chase policy have been good signs of change but that there is still a long way to go.
He wishes justice had been served for the eight police officers who shot Walker and were not indicted by a grand jury. The police department also found in an internal investigation that the officers’ use of force was justified.
“In my opinion it was excessive; those officers were wrong,” he said.
Going forward, DeJournett said he wants Akron’s police officers to get to know the city better, perhaps by being required to live here — a city mandate that was struck down by the Ohio Supreme Court in 2009. If they are more of a part of the community, he said, they are likely to react differently than if they feel like outsiders to residents.
He also wants more mental health and de-escalation training for police.
Incidents like one involving Dierra Fields, an Akron woman who was charged with obstructing official business and resisting arrest after she was body-slammed by an Akron police officer, are still excessive, DeJournett said. So was the shooting of 15-year-old Tavion Koonce Williams, who was struck in the wrist. The officer came out of the car shooting, DeJournett said, and Tavion “didn’t even have a chance.”
Two years after Walker’s killing, DeJournett wants to see fewer incidents like those in the community.
“Things like that make you wonder,” he said. “What are we learning from our past experiences? … Are we really learning from our past?”
Robert Hubbard: ‘They can’t have another Jayland situation’
As Jayland Walker’s high school wrestling coach at Buchtel Community Learning Center, Robert Hubbard knew Walker as a sweet kid who wasn’t a superstar but who would never be out-worked.
Hubbard said Walker was always supportive of his teammates and didn’t have a bad word to say about anyone. After graduating from high school, Walker would come back to offer his coach whatever help he might need.
“Anything I asked him to do he did it. He would run into a wall for me,” Hubbard said. “I wish I had 10 Jayland Walkers on my team.”
His shooting death by police who are supposed to protect and serve Akron was tragic and devastating, Hubbard said. He said Walker’s killing hurt him and hurt the community.
“He was a well-liked kid,” he said. “The way they reacted, no questions, no attempt at de-escalation, just immediately — I mean, you see rabid animals not get treated like that, not get shot at like that.”
The police response to the protests was equally troubling, Hubbard said, as officers arrested dozens of people as well as beat, tear-gassed and pepper-sprayed protesters. It made him reconsider living in Akron and whether his three Black sons would be safe here. The response, he said, “really shook me.”
It seemed as though police were making efforts to connect with the community and improve relations, Hubbard said, but incidents such as the shooting of Tavion Koonce Williams, who was struck in the wrist by a bullet fired by an officer immediately after exiting his car, challenge his inherent optimism.
“That almost mirrored the Tamir Rice situation,” he said of the 12-year-old shot in 2014 by Cleveland police within seconds of their arrival while he was playing with a toy gun. “There but by the grace of God.”
Hubbard attended public conversations with Brian Harding, Akron’s new police chief, before Harding was officially named to the job. He said Harding seems heartfelt in his desire to create a more compassionate police force in the city.
The Ohio Supreme Court struck down a residency requirement in 2009, but Hubbard said he thinks the relationship between police and residents would be better if officers were required to live in the city and didn’t only see young people of color when they were getting in trouble but, rather, ran into them at church, the bowling alley or the grocery store.
He also can’t believe that with 94 shots fired at Walker by eight Akron police officers, no one was disciplined.
All he wants, Hubbard said, is for Akron police not to be an occupying force in the city.
“What happened that night to Jayland should never happen again,” he said. “I’m just hopeful, and I hope they don’t let me down. I hope they don’t break my heart. They can’t have another Jayland situation. That cannot be.”
Towanda Mullins: ‘These steps turn to progress’
If you want to honor Jayland Walker, Towanda Mullins said, you have to remember him.
“We haven’t forgotten about his family, we haven’t forgotten about him,” said Mullins, who lives in the Copley-Fairlawn area. “We haven’t forgotten about the community he belonged to.”
The pain of Walker’s death is going to linger in Akron and for his family, she said. It has left psychological scars. But Mullins said that makes efforts to rebuild trust in the city all the more important.
There should be more events where people can come together, she said. And the new police chief, in particular, has an opportunity to build support in the community, to help people meet in the middle.
It’s one of the ways to create a positive path for change, she said.
Mullins doesn’t think it will be fast or easy. Change takes time, she said. And everyone has to commit to justice.
“If we think [in] the two years, that there has been a drastic change, we’re fooling ourselves,” she said. “It just doesn’t work that way.”
While important conversations have started in the community, Mullins said it could be decades before there’s much impact for residents.
Keeping community awareness on the topic of Walker’s death and the efforts that have come out of it is important, Mullins said.
“Eventually, these steps turn to progress. These steps reflect change,” she said. “I’m not gonna put a timeline on it ’cause no one knows. But eventually, this progress will come to a real change and reflect on a more equitable and just society for all.”
Jasina Chapman: ‘It’s not an overnight process’
Jayland Walker’s death hasn’t led to many tangible changes in Akron, but it has changed the community conversation, Jasina Chapman said.
A community activist and volunteer with the NAACP, Chapman said tensions are sometimes higher now in the city. Since Independent Police Auditor Anthony Finnell was named in March, she said, reports out of his office that highlight systemic issues with use of force in the police department have made feelings of retribution and retaliation felt by Black residents seem more justified.
“You’ve got someone on the outside saying, ‘Your system is racist, your system is not equitable for people,’” she said. “You finally have an external voice saying that, that has helped change the conversation. But it’s not an overnight process because the issues of Akron run too deep.”
Still, Chapman said she’s encouraged by the fact that there has continued to be discussion between community members and the city administration, including law enforcement officials. Young people in particular are showing up more and demanding they be listened to, she said.
She’d like to see the city take more tangible steps to diversify the appointed committees and boards that do a lot of work in the city — not just by race, but by background and experience. Chapman said doing so will go a long way toward helping create a more just system that’s representative of the community, even as the racism ingrained in the system remains.
“Racism in the City of Akron is real and it’s not a people thing, it’s a structure thing,” she said. “The structure is what originally decided not to prosecute the officers who killed Jayland Walker. What I learned is that our structure is fractured and not completely representative of the City of Akron.”
Chapman said it’s also important to improve economic development and educational opportunities because they represent hope. She’s optimistic as more people talk to each other that there’s more understanding of Akron’s needs and what it takes to make a change.
“I have hope that people are affected enough to do something, affected enough to vote, affected enough to hold people accountable,” she said. “That is my hope.”
Diana Autry: ‘Are you willing to change your attitude?’
Diana Autry didn’t know Jayland Walker personally, but as the president of the Buchtel Community Learning Center Parent Teacher Association, she said she recognized the one-time high school wrestler as a Grif.
So it was particularly devastating, she said, to see him vilified after he was shot 46 times and killed by police in an incident that galvanized the city and led to days of protests.
“It’s amazing to me that any human being would believe that number of bullets is necessary in any situation,” said Autry, who is now the president of the Akron Board of Education. “And the justifications that people make is just disappointing.”
In response to Walker’s killing, Autry said she was encouraged to see the way residents — and particularly young people — organized to get the Citizens’ Police Oversight Board on the ballot. She’s glad to see them more civically engaged. She’s pleased that mental health and social workers are part of new teams that interact with the community on police calls, and she hopes that the new mayor and police chief can help rebuild trust.
But she’s still bothered by what feels like a lack of humanity from some quarters, a willingness from some to jump to conclusions about people they don’t know.
Autry, a nurse, said she recognizes that police officers have a difficult job because she’s also been spit on, kicked and cussed out at work. She’d like to see officers receive more training in topics such as human development, psychology and sociology, to better react to difficult situations.
She also wants to see more community training regarding safe, responsible gun use so people in Ohio — an open-carry state — don’t automatically assume the worst when they see a Black person with a gun.
“There’s just a certain humanity that is not afforded to certain groups,” she said. “We’re immediately assumed to be doing something wrong and criminal. I think that’s just so unfair.”
Mindset changes are necessary, she said, for actual change to occur.
“It always boils down to that person in the mirror and what they’re willing to do,” she said. “Are you willing to change your attitude and help change the attitude of your family and friends?”
Gregory Harrison: ‘There’s more pressure now’
On the second anniversary of Jayland Walker’s death, Antioch Baptist Church Pastor Gregory Harrison said Black residents of Akron still don’t feel as though their concerns are recognized.
“I don’t think there’s an adequate understanding of why the Black community is upset,” he said. “The community still feels like they are not being heard. There’s still no change.”
The Citizens’ Police Oversight Board was oversold, he said, and there are trust issues on both sides.
“I think the change is really that things have gotten worse,” Harrison said. “We have created a powder keg, and two years later, the people who think they managed that well, I don’t think they understand there’s more pressure now. It’s more delicate now.
“I don’t think Akron will survive a third round.”
With Walker’s killing, Harrison said, the cancer in the community was identified. But there’s still no treatment. The conditions people live in have not changed, he said. The system that led the officers who shot Walker to avoid indictment by a grand jury has not changed.
Since Walker’s death, though, people are asking more questions and working to hold more people accountable. Harrison said before the outrage surrounding Walker’s killing, it’s unlikely that Dierra Fields, an Akron woman who was charged with obstructing official business and resisting arrest after an incident in which she was body-slammed by an Akron police officer, would have been found not guilty.
“Juries are listening more,” he said. “They’re demanding more from public officials.”
Harrison is himself a former police officer and said he left after 15 years of working in Akron and Cleveland because of the racism and brutality on the force. He called himself “one of the biggest offenders,” saying he knew how to write up an incident report to avoid making it look as though excessive force was used.
He’s since become outspoken about the need for reform. Changing the mindset of officers, he said, will take time — especially as the gulf between police and the community has widened.
“I don’t think people have been heard,” he said. “Things have gone back to pre-Jayland Walker.”
Angel Williams: ‘They’re allowed to do anything and get away with it’
Since her 15-year-old son, Tavion Koonce Williams, was shot in the wrist by an Akron police officer in April, Angel Williams has feared for her family.
Tavion has had trouble sleeping, she said, and has lost 25 pounds. He doesn’t want to be around officers, and neither does she — Williams said she’s scared of being pulled over, she’s scared of being around police at all.
“When he goes to sleep he still sees the shot being fired, he still hears it,” she said. “He hasn’t shook back to his regular self.”
The day before the anniversary of Jayland Walker’s death at the hands of police, Williams said she thinks the situation in Akron has gotten worse, not better.
“I think those officers need to be held accountable,” she said. “I think it was horrendous. I think it was barbaric. And I think that our police system is horrendous and barbaric. And I think that they’re wild animals. …
“No human being should shoot a person down like that. If they wouldn’t shoot a dog like that, why would you shoot a person like that? … You gave a dog more grace than what you gave Jayland Walker.”
Although the officer who shot Tavion was fired from the force, it wasn’t because of that incident. Williams said she doesn’t expect much from the Akron Police Department.
“I see a lot of people’s rights being violated, every day. I don’t see anything changing right now, not for the better,” she said. “I feel like it’s getting worse because police [are] allowed — at this point, shoot kids and get away with it. They’re allowed to do anything and get away with it.”
She wishes that all officers’ personnel files were readily available for the public to peruse. If they were, she said, the public would have insight into who was policing them.
Williams said the entire American system needs to change. She thinks indigenous land needs to be returned, she said, and the Black community needs to be able to police itself.
“The system is not for us,” she said. “It’s not for my people.”
Teresa LeGrair: ‘We can’t give up trying’
In the decade since Eric Garner was killed by police officers in New York, incident after incident of police violence has grabbed national attention, leading to calls for change. But it wasn’t until Jayland Walker was killed in Akron in a barrage of gunfire in 2022 that the issue of police violence was truly felt locally, said Teresa LeGrair, the president and CEO of the Akron Urban League.
(Photo courtesy of Garrick Black)
“Because of Jayland Walker’s killing, there has been, certainly, a heightened awareness in the community at large about the need for change,” she said. “I think that brought something so close to home that many people have never experienced before; it’s always a news story from afar. … When it hit so close to home, I think it changed a lot of perspective[s], it changed a lot of people.”
That doesn’t mean that there has been a lot of tangible change when it comes to the city’s justice system, LeGrair said. But increasing awareness of police violence has led more people to question how officers respond to crime — and why, in Walker’s case, so much firepower was used.
Such a reckoning ended some relationships, LeGrair said. But it created others, and with the change in Akron’s city leadership, there’s more of a feeling of positivity in the community.
Still, that positivity is threatened, she said, with processes like the one that led Mayor Shammas Malik to choose a police chief from a limited pool of only-white candidates from within the department. LeGrair said it sometimes feels like a roller coaster ride, the ups of diverse leadership in Malik’s cabinet followed by the downs of the rushed cancellation of the city’s Juneteenth events two weeks ago.
Going forward, she’d like to see more sensitivity training for police, specifically related to overcoming bias. Officers are taking steps to be more visible in Akron’s communities, she said, an effort that is being noticed.
“Out of that tragedy does come some positivity,” LeGrair said. “Sometimes it’s just frustrating to talk about it because you want to be farther down the pike than you are. I think everybody ultimately wants the same thing, which is peace, harmony, to live safely in all communities.
“Sometimes those things can be more elusive than you’d like them to be,” she said. “But we can’t give up trying. It’s just so important.”
Marc Neal: ‘Accountability has not occurred’
After Jayland Walker was killed by police, then-Police Chief Steve Mylett promised to give an accounting of each bullet fired by the eight officers who were later found to be justified in the killing, said Marc Neal, pastor of Dominion Family Church on West Thornton Street.
Neal is still waiting for that accounting.
“There has not been any resolution,” he said. “He did not fulfill his obligation. … How can we say something has changed if accountability has not occurred?”
While the city is settling with protesters over unconstitutional policing, Neal said there has been no resolution with Walker’s family. Federal court records indicate the Walker family lawsuit against the city is still ongoing.
Still, he sees some signs of optimism: namely, the communication that is taking place among clergy and with the new police chief and the mayor.
In some communities, Neal said, there will never be a good relationship with officers. In others, officers can make headway with training and effort. He’d like to see more emphasis on de-escalation and fewer incidents like one earlier this year where a teenager holding a toy gun, Tavion Koonce Williams, was shot in the wrist by a police officer. That officer was later fired for previous, unrelated issues.
Neal would like to see more punishment for officers who are involved in shootings. Suspension with pay, he said, is like a vacation.
“Terminate them without their pension; they’ll start changing things,” he said. “If you start saying, look, there’s going to be consequences for your actions as an officer and as a criminal, that’s how it is.”
Neal is involved in a group of more than 50 clergy members who are organizing to work together to be more visible in their efforts to improve the community. He said he hopes communication will continue to improve to make things better — but not just for the sake of talking. He wants resolutions.
“We all live in this community,” he said. “This is where we live. This is where we live.”
