Every new wrinkle in the Philando Castile shooting is sadder than the last.
We reported earlier today that a newly released interview with Jeronimo Yanez, the officer who fatally shot Castile, showed that Yanez believed Castile was dangerous due to the smell of marijuana allegedly coming from Castile's car, and Yanez’s belief that Castile could have been a drug dealer.
Watching the footage of the shooting that was released yesterday moved many to tears.
As we read through the interview, we couldn’t help but wonder how the little girl in the car, the daughter of Castile’s girlfriend Diamond Reynolds, was doing. How she must have felt, her young eyes watching Castile being splattered across the front seat.
Now we know.
After Castile was shot, Reynolds was handcuffed and placed in the back of a police car with her daughter.
The car’s camera and microphones captured their exchange. Reynolds’ shock. Her daughter’s fear that her mother would also “get shooted.”
Her mother tries to comfort her.
But the daughter is at a loss, tearfully saying, “I wish this town was safer. We wouldn’t live in this. I don’t want it to be like this anymore.”
Why does it have to be like this? Why do we have to live like this?
Why must a child fear, and why must a mother be forced to — with her hands bound — try to comfort her child after they both watched the man she loved be riddled with bullets?
“Tell that to the police when they come, okay?” Reynolds told her daughter in answer to her lamentations, “Tell them that you wish they didn’t have to kill people.”
Unmoved by the dead, unmoved by protests, may those motivated to kill out of fear or prejudice be moved at least by the tears of this child.