Video of D.C. Police Fatally Shooting Violence Interrupter Sparks Protests

The Washington Post / Jenny Gathright, Ellie Silverman, Peter Hermann, Emma Uber, Tom Jackman

13:49 JST, September 11, 2024

Rising tensions in the nation’s capital over the police killing of a man who had worked to stop violence boiled over Monday night following the release of body-camera videos from two officers involved in the fatal shooting, sparking unrest reminiscent of the city’s protest-filled summer and fall of 2020.

People angry about the shooting took to the streets in protest in the hours after officials published the footage. D.C. police said they made five arrests related to burglaries or attempted burglaries of various businesses overnight, including a Gucci store in downtown’s City Center development and two liquor stores in Georgetown, and police said they were investigating whether those incidents were connected to the demonstrations.

Anger was already simmering over the death of Justin Robinson, 26, a resident of Southeast Washington who was employed as a violence interrupter with D.C.’s Cure the Streets program. He worked for the National Association for the Advancement of Returning Citizens, which is contracted by the D.C. attorney general’ s office to quell conflicts between crews in several D.C. neighborhoods.

A large vigil was held Friday, at which community members and Robinson’s family decried the sudden shooting, and a protest was planned for Tuesday night outside the Seventh District police station.

“A lot of people was crushed and hurt” by Robinson’s killing, said Curtis “Coach Peedy” Monroe, a program manager with the Alliance of Concerned Men, who said Robinson was known for his credibility and talent in mediating violence in the MLK neighborhood, where he was from. People saw him change his life – and it inspired others to do the same, Monroe said. “He wanted change and peace,” said Monroe.

The body-camera footage released late Monday captured the chaotic moments when officers surrounded Robinson’s car after it crashed into a McDonald’s restaurant, and as they attempted to rouse him, before ultimately opening fire in a manner that elicited outrage from his family and supporters.

After officers arrived, police said, they noticed a handgun in Robinson’s lap. When he stirred, several officers began yelling at him to put his hands up, according to the video, which shows one officer pointing his gun at Robinson and threatening to shoot him in the face. When Robinson allegedly reached for the officer’s gun, the officer – identified by D.C. police as Bryan Gilchrist – fired 10 shots at Robinson, while a second officer, Vasco Mateus, fired one shot.

“What happened to Justin was not de-escalation, it wasn’t proportional and it wasn’t reasonable. It was brutality,” Brandon Burrell, a lawyer for Robinson’s family, said in a statement.

D.C. Police Chief Pamela A. Smith, at a news conference, declined to comment on whether the officers at the scene followed protocol, saying that would be part of the investigation into the shooting. The officers have not responded to interview requests.

The footage was published the same day police in Miami released video of NFL player Tyreek Hill being yanked from his car and handcuffed face down on the ground during a traffic stop, rekindling national debate about police violence against Black people. And on Tuesday, sentencing began for two D.C. police officers who were convicted of killing 20-year-old Karon Hylton-Brown as he fled from them on a moped in October 2020. That incident set off a round of demonstrations and marches that followed on the heels of the summer-long protests of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, which turned parts of Washington into a landscape of boarded-up storefronts.

Policing experts who reviewed the video for this article said that while the situation appears to have been challenging for officers, there were other things police could have tried before approaching the vehicle.

“From a tactical perspective, it’s really poor from start to finish in my view,” said William Terrill, a criminology professor at Arizona State University who studies police use of force. Officers could have set up a perimeter and tried to wake Robinson from a distance with a loudspeaker, he said, because no one else was in the car or appeared to be in immediate danger from the weapon in Robinson’s lap, so there was no need to rush.

Ian Adams, a policing scholar at the University of South Carolina, credited the D.C. officers with initially considering standard policing tactics, such as trying to remove the gun without startling Robinson. However, he predicted that investigators will question why officers advanced once he moved. “We typically teach officers that cover and distance are the best first tactic,” he said.

The D.C. police department’s use-of-force guidelines do not specifically address the circumstances surrounding these types of encounters, though police policies prohibit officers in most instances from firing at moving vehicles and say that officers “shall avoid tactics that could place them in a position where a vehicle could be used against them.” Police say that such directives are designed to govern policy but that tactics can change in an instant depending on a variety of nuanced factors, such as whether the firearm is within reach of the person.

The footage released Monday from the body cameras of Gilchrist and Mateus captures officers deciding to box in Robinson’s vehicle with two police cars, then gaming out their next moves. One suggested reaching through an open back window to unlock the door, so officers could grab Robinson’s gun. Some discussed using a ballistic shield to approach the car.

As they talked, Robinson began to stir, eliciting a swift response from officers who approached the car and yelled at him to keep his hands off his gun and to put his hands up. When he rolled his window partially down, the video shows, an officer whom police identified as Gilchrist pointed his gun toward him through the open window. Robinson can be seen reaching his hand toward the weapon.

“I’ll shoot you in your [expletive] face,” Gilchrist said. He fired 10 shots at Robinson, and Mateus fired one additional shot, officials said.

A different vantage point in a video published by police also showed a gun dropping onto Robinson’s lap as shots were fired. It is difficult to tell where it came from in the footage, but police officials identified that gun as Robinson’s.

The police account and video echo the August 2021 fatal shooting of an armed man roused from sleep at the wheel of a running car in Northeast Washington, for which D.C. police Sgt. Enis Jevric, 42, was sentenced last month to five years in prison after pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter. Then, as with Robinson, officers surrounded the car of 27-year-old An’Twan Gilmore, debated what to do with his vehicle’s closed windows and doors, and in that case had Jevric take the lead role with a ballistic shield as he and other officers with their weapons drawn attempted to wake the driver. In that case, police found Gilmore with a loaded handgun in his waistband, where they said they saw it initially.

In Jevric’s case both the government and his defense cited the novelty and danger of the situation, saying police had no procedure for dealing with an armed, sleeping or unconscious person locked in a vehicle. Police after Gilmore’s shooting adopted a policy that officers should respond to such an instance as if it were a barricade-type situation, calling in special response units with protective gear. It is not clear why that did not immediately occur in Robinson’s case, though one officer can be seen holding a large riot shield. Police officials said Monday that officers can choose to declare a barricade situation that triggers the arrival of an Emergency Response Team of officers with specialized training. They said Robinson awoke as police were still deciding whether to declare a barricade.

D.C. police said little about the officers who fired, including whether they had been involved in previous instances of serious or deadly uses of force. Public salary database records show Gilchrist has been on the force a little over two years and Mateus four years. Both officers have been placed on paid administrative leave. The U.S. attorney’s office for D.C. will decide if criminal charges are warranted. A spokeswoman for the office declined to comment, saying only that the shooting was under investigation.

Burrell, the family attorney, said he was not sure what caused Robinson’s car to crash that night.

“Obviously the person who could give the most answers was Justin,” he said. But what happened next, Burrell said, was inappropriate. “I would like an answer about whether it was consistent with policy for when Justin rolls down that window for the officer to stick his gun in the window and in Justin’s face,” said Burrell. “I think anyone who woke up with a gun in their face would have that reaction.”

Smith, at a news conference Monday, pledged that police would “continue to be transparent as we investigate this incident, as long as it does not compromise the investigation,” saying, “Any loss of life is a tragic outcome for the family and our community.”

Police said they would increase their patrols around possible business targets Tuesday night.

Jawanna Hardy, who runs an anti-violence nonprofit called Guns Down Friday, said she mobilized Monday night when she saw “youth talk” on social media after the video was released that didn’t sound positive.

She reached out to those young people – and their parents – and said that while she understood their desire to do something, this was not the right time. She told them to go home and stay home.

“Kids,” she recalled telling them, “you guys need to be in the house. You need to be trained to protest. You have to be with responsible adults, and Ms. Hardy is not going downtown tonight.”

In total, Hardy, who is also a violence interrupter, estimates she stopped about 30 kids from protesting Monday night. Still, she said she understands the overwhelming anger and devastation people are feeling after watching the video of Robinson’s death.

“To see that video, and for that to be someone who you stood by – the person that influenced you to stop the violence has been violently killed – is confusing,” Hardy said. “Sometimes you’re watching all your work, Justin’s work, just go down the drain because of the way his life was taken. So, so tragic, so, so wrong.”

On Tuesday, more than 100 protesters rallied and marched between the Seventh District police station and the McDonald’s where Robinson was fatally shot.

Some held up posters reading, “I’m sleep, don’t shoot.” One woman printed the phrase on a T-shirt, while a 16-year-old girl wore a shirt showing a photo of her older brother and Robinson posing together in their high school football uniforms. At one point, the protesters locked arms with friends and strangers in a testament to Robinson’s work as a violence interrupter.

About 10 p.m., D.C. police said, people began throwing bottles, rocks and other objects at officers. Three people were arrested.

“Y’all being here. This is enough right here. We got different people from different neighborhoods standing in unity, standing together,” said Jawan Johnson, 26, an outreach specialist with the Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement. “We’re here to get your attention. Give us the justice we deserve.”