The Shooting of Tony McDade

Shortly after 11 AM on May 27, a 38 year-old African American transgender man named Tony McDade was brutally shot in Leon Arms apartment complex by a police officer in Tallahassee, Florida. Just earlier, Malik Jackson, a 21 year-old African American was fatally stabbed on the same street. In the early reports of the shooting, McDade was misgendered as a woman who identified as a man. McDade was a prime suspect in the fatal stabbing of Jackson that had occurred just before. The Tallahassee Police Department stated that McDade was armed with a gun which he pointed at the police, and that a knife covered with blood was found at the scene. However, reports from eyewitness testimonies directly contradicted the statements released by the Police Department that McDade had a gun on him at the scene of the crime.

On the morning of the incident, McDade stated on a Facebook Live video that

“It took five of you to kick and punch and have me on the ground in a fetal position. And I came out looking the same way I was before I went in that fetal position...But y'all know what, y'all aint gone look the same when them bullets touch your dome.”

During the incident, The Department Police Chief Lawrence Revelle revealed to reporters that “[Tony McDade] was in possession of a handgun, and a bloody knife was found at the scene.” Witnesses of the crime have disproved this through videos that were posted on Facebook, claiming that that the officers said “Stop moving, n****r” and proceed to fatally shoot McDade even after he stopped moving. The videos also revealed that the Police officers never revealed their identities, neither instructed McDade to stop moving.

The same day, investigations followed into the incident of Jackons’s stabbing, as well as the subsequent shooting of McDade. Currently, the officer involved in the shooting is under administrative leave pending the investigation. McDade’s vigil was organized by the Tallahassee Community Action Committee to draw attention to three deaths related to police brutality. On May 27, a petition was created which publicized McDade’s case, and for him to be recognized as a transgender man in any official documentation and reports. Over 100 LGBTQ orgnanizations have included McDade in a list of recent transgender killings. It is clear that LGBTQ people of color are at the greatest risk of violence in this nation. We must take action and change that today.

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Credits

Schneider/Tallahassee Democrat