BOYNTON BEACH — The roar of engines and a wave of voices stuffed U.S. 1 in Boynton Beach on Saturday afternoon as greater than 1,000 folks shut down the freeway for round two hours.
They marched collectively in grief for a Boynton Beach teen killed Dec. 26 throughout a traffic stop on U.S. 1 and Northeast Eighth Avenue.
The engines belonged to dirt bikes, bikes, all-terrain automobiles, electrical bicycles, and different automobiles pushed by folks young and old.
The voices belonged to members of the family, buddies and strangers to Stanley Davis Jr., who was driving a dirt bike when police stated he misplaced management of it, hit the median, and crashed right into a road signal throughout an tried traffic stop. Davis, referred to as “SJ” by buddies, died on the scene.
Crowds on the rally Saturday needed to honor Davis’ life. Sporting T-shirts and hoodies along with his images, indicators that learn “Justice for SJ” and carrying crimson balloons, they marched down U.S. 1 to the positioning of his demise earlier than turning west and ending at Sarah Sims Park.
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But additionally they needed solutions about what led as much as the crash.
Top of thoughts for many marchers was the demise of a Black teen throughout a traffic stop — a well-known state of affairs that has sparked racial justice protests nationwide and created a heightened skepticism of police.
Surveillance video from a Chevron fuel station one-quarter mile south of the crash web site confirmed a police car with its lights on pursue Davis on his bike. Dirt bikes aren’t permitted on streets in Boynton Beach.
“We want to see the body camera footage,” Mary Barber-Nelson, Davis’ godmother, advised The Palm Beach Post. “We need justice and change from the top down in the police department.”
The metropolis stated it had not geared up the police automobile concerned in the crash with a dashboard digital camera. Police haven’t stated whether or not the officer was carrying a physique digital camera and whether or not it was activated.
The Boynton Beach Police Department has not launched the title of the officer concerned in the incident, citing a 2018 modification to the state structure modeled after California’s Marsy’s Law, which permits crime victims to withhold their data from public data.
Department spokeswoman Stephanie Slater stated for the reason that officer has been the topic of threats for the reason that incident, and subsequently can invoke Marsy’s Law. The officer is on administrative go away throughout the investigation by the Florida Highway Patrol.
While a handful of police automobiles have been seen directing traffic across the rally, officers didn’t look like ticketing anybody concerned.
‘It might have been me,’ biker remembers at crash web site
On Saturday, households with younger youngsters attended the rally to stroll down U.S. 1 alongside a sturdy group of Black bikers, all-terrain car riders and three-wheel “slingshot” bike house owners.
Individual drivers revved their engines and tricked-out vehicles did doughnuts in the intersection of Martin Luther King Jr. and Seacrest boulevards — leaving tire marks as bodily symbols of the group’s grief.
Clouds of exhaust stuffed the air as Davis’ mom, Shannon Thompson, led the group in a second of silence close to a makeshift memorial for her solely youngster on the median on U.S. 1.
Nearby, 27-year-old biker Zakee Marrow took in the scene from the seat of his shiny crimson bike. His helmet featured a shiny crimson mohawk to match.
“This whole situation means a lot to me because it could have been me,” Marrow stated, including that he grew up driving dirt bikes round Lake Worth Beach.
Marrow stated he needs to see town construct a spot for youngsters to journey bikes and motorized automobiles that is removed from busy roads and police.
“We need a place to go. There’s nowhere for a kid to be a kid anymore,” he stated. “How can you tell a kid that they’re wrong for riding their bike?”
Others need to see extra systemic modifications in policing.
“We’ve just been through this so many times,” Alisa Wright of Boynton Beach, advised The Palm Beach Post. “With (the police shooting of) Corey Jones in 2015, George Floyd, the names just go on and on and on. We’re not treated fairly here in America.”
Wright, a instructor in West Palm Beach, stated she attended Saturday’s rally to indicate assist for Davis’ household and advocate for a fairer world for her college students at Roosevelt Middle School.
“This is 2022,” she stated. “This is not the civil rights movement or the 1960s. We have to do better and we demand better. We’re asking for accountability and transparency.”
kkokal@pbpost.com
@katikokal