(Reuters) – Police in Columbus, Ohio, shot a Black 16-year-old girl to death on Tuesday after confronting her while responding to a report of a person armed with a knife, according to the mayor, the youngster’s family and media.
The Columbus Dispatch reported a crowd of protesters had gathered near a home on the city’s southeast side where the shooting occurred, just minutes before the guilty verdict was announced against the police officer charged with murdering George Floyd last year.
According to the newspaper, police involved in the shooting were answering an emergency-911 call reporting an attempted stabbing by a female suspect.
Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther confirmed the fatal shooting, saying on Twitter that “a young woman tragically lost her life.”
The police officers involved had body worn cameras and the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation (BCI) had opened an inquiry into the case, he said.
“We will share information that we can as soon as it becomes available,” the mayor said on Twitter. “I’m asking residents to remain calm and allow BCI to gather the facts.”
He did give any detail of the circumstances of the shooting. No information on the shooting was immediately made available by the city police department.
Family members have identified the girl killed in the shooting as Makiyah Bryant, aged 16.
A woman identified in the Columbia Dispatch account as the girl’s aunt, Hazel Bryant, told the newspaper the teenager lived in a foster home and became involved in an altercation with someone at the residence.
She said her niece dropped a knife she was carrying before she was shot multiple times by a police officer, according to the Columbia Dispatch. Those details could not be independently verified.
(Reporting by Rich McKay in Atlanta; Editing by Robert Birsel)
