At Sunday vigils, hundreds gather to remember lives lost to police brutality

Hundreds gathered Sunday afternoon in a historic black cemetery in Dallas to mourn for George Floyd, whose death last week while pinned down by a Minneapolis police officer has set off national unrest and protest.

“We cry for our sons who have been taken away,” said Olinka Green, a mother and a veteran civil rights activist. “We mourn for you.”

An altar was made around a large statue of a man and a woman. It was filled with yellow roses, candles and the images of black men and women who have lost their lives in police shootings in Texas and across the nation. Hundreds of names of black people and Latinos were read aloud.

The setting under oak trees was ironic: Larger-than-life sculptures honored emancipated slaves in what was an African American neighborhood before gentrification. Once called Freedman’s town, it is now largely known as Uptown.

The night before protests in Uptown and downtown turned chaotic and violent with police firing tear gas canisters and rubber pellet into crowds. In Uptown, windows were broken at some businesses and luxury towers.

Sunday’s event, though, was peaceful and dignified. The crowd filed into the cemetery’s marble arches to receive a sage cleansing. Organizers said the rituals honored their ancestors and were aimed at creating “a healing circle in defense of black lives.”

But it was clear that many were fed up with the loss of so many black people and Latinos to police-involved shootings and deaths while in custody.

Mercedes Fulbright, one of the organizers with Black Youth Project 100, called for an end “to the war on black people.” More money should be spent on heath care and education, where deep inequities exist, Fulbright said.

“Invest in our community. Defund police,” Fulbright told the crowd.

After her talk, Fulbright said, “We have righteous rage, and anger, and in that you can still have healing. So for us, this is a supplement. This is additional to what’s happening in the streets. ... This is honestly just a moment to pause and to catch our breath, so that we can go back out and continue the fight.”

Nationwide, cities have erupted in unrest since a viral video showed Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes. Floyd cried for help and was later pronounced dead. Chauvin has been charged with murder.

At Sunday’s event, organizers focused on North Texans like Atatiana Jefferson and Santos Rodriguez. Jefferson was fatally shot by a Fort Worth police officer in October as she was babysitting her nephew at home. She was a 28-year-old pre-med graduate student.

Rodriguez was 12 when he was shot in the head by a Dallas police officer on a July night in 1973. Downtown Dallas erupted with protests then and businesses were vandalized.

Clarice Criss came looking for comfort at the cemetery event, where spiritual rituals took prominence over slogans. “I feel hopeless,” Criss said. “We as a people are tired and we don’t know where our energy will come from to get us through.”

Indiana Taylor said she’s gone to each of the Dallas street protests, but knew the cemetery vigil would be different. “We need healing right now. We need to decompress. We don’t yell here because our ancestors are here.”

Near her a sign read: “But you are not here. You were taken away.”

Also on Sunday, hundreds gathered at Dallas police headquarters for an early evening prayer vigil led by several of the city’s pastors and clergy.

The pastors represented churches from different denominations across all sections of Dallas. But they maintained one focus: the need for justice and change.

“We’re here, not just for George Floyd, but we’re also here for Breonna Taylor. We’re also here for Ahmaud Arbery,” the Rev. Bryan Carter said as he listed names of black Americans killed by police officers. “This is not just about one case. This is about case after case. Young men’s life after another young man’s life that has been taken.”

Carter, pastor at Concord Church, said the pastors organized the event because the church needs to be present in social justice issues. There can’t be faith without work, he told the crowd.

“What good is it to go to church all day and to sing songs about God and lift holy hands in worship, and yet we are not concerned about the injustice that faces the everyday life of people of color?” Carter said. “We believe that the church and people of faith play an important part of bringing healing and restoration to our city and to our nation.”

The Rev. Jeff Warren of Park Cities Baptist Church challenged more white Americans to join the fight against social injustice. Warren, who is white, invoked the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s disdain for the so-called “white moderate” — white Americans who chose to remain silent during the civil rights movement.

“We will step into the fray because we’ve been called to do so,” Warren said. “If you’re a believer in Jesus, my Jesus-ness must trump my whiteness every single time.”

Staff writer Joe Hoyt contributed to this report.