OAKLAND (KRON)—Another family who lost a loved one in a police shooting sharing their thoughts Saturday night on holding officers accountable.
Oscar Grant was shot and killed by a BART police officer in 2009.
His mother is now an activist against police brutality.
KRON4’S Ella Sogomonian says what Wanda Johnson had to say Saturday night about the new police videos in Charlotte.
“African American people are looked at for the color of their skin but not whats in their heart and we really need to change that,” Oscar Grant Foundation CEO Wanda Johnson said.
Johnson lost her son Oscar Grant in 2009 when he was shot and killed by a BART police officer at the Fruitvale Station in Oakland.
That shooting was captured on video and is now one of several in the last seven years that has surfaced.
Images like these have stirred a debate about race and policing in America igniting protests across the country and here in the Bay Area.
“And I think it’s important to not only protest but to come up with strategies where our society will see hey it’s not back to business as usual,” Johnson said.
Saturday night, hundreds more took to the streets of Oakland, this time in protest of the shooting death Keith Scott in Charlotte, North Carolina.
“The officers need more training than just 6 months to learn how to deescalate the situation instead of escalate the situation,” Johnson said.
Johnson believes protests should continue to highlight what she believes is an ongoing problem of systemic racism in policing and a failing criminal justice system.
“And I pray that that message is to change the way that we’re policing and to change the way our judicial system is currently being ran,” Johnson said.