Credit where credit is due: CNN’s Don Lemon, known for his bias, erroneous assumptions and bad takes, spoke the truth about 16-year-old Makiyah Bryant, who was wielding a knife while attempting to stab someone before being shot by police.
Credit where credit is due: CNN’s Don Lemon, known for his bias, erroneous assumptions and bad takes, spoke the truth about 16-year-old Makiyah Bryant, who was wielding a knife while attempting to stab someone before being shot by police.
Wednesday night, the pair were discussing the officer involved shooting of 16-year-old Makiyah Bryant and unlike many others in the media acknowledged the teen was wielding a knife and attempting to stab someone when the police arrived.
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Cuomo complimented Lemon on not rushing to judgement regarding the incident. "You were really actually, you have to be honest, let’s let the audience into something. So, Don and I heard about this story last night on social media, while we were doing coverage for you of the Chauvin verdict last night, the initial reports didn't seem right.
"And it was so interesting for me as emotional and personal as these stories are, or someone of color, especially Don, you with your background, you were cautious about it, you were saying, ‘huh? Hmm. I want to see this one. I want to see this,’ because there was a lot of emotion and understandably so. You got a 16-year-old kid that's gone."
Lemon agreed before Cuomo continued. "Yeah. And it's a hard one. I do not know how to explain this to people in a way that doesn't make somebody very angry."
Lemmon responded, "Well, yes. And we're dealing with a lot of emotion right now, and I'm going to talk about that in a moment. And I think that is, it's real. And you have to take that, that part has to be taken into account. There's a lot of anguish that people are very emotional right now, but we've gotta be fair about what happens when police arrive at scenes. It is tragic. That is the 16-year-old girl, just as it is tragic that it's a 13 year old in Chicago. When police are chasing people, they don't know how old they are. And they don't run and say, Hey, how old are you? Oh, I'm 13. You know, my mom, let me be. You don't know that? Or I'm 16. When they roll up on a scene, they see people tussling around. Someone has a knife, and their job is to protect and serve every life on that scene. And if they see someone who is in the process of taking a life, what does that decision, what decision do they have to make? And I know that people say, well, you know, you can do this, you can do that. Tasers don't work the way guns work, not at that distance."
Cuomo added, "Not at that that distance, with that amount of time."
Lemon continued, "Tasers, they don't always connect. So, you've got to get, you know, two prongs or what have you. And it's got to connect to whatever."
Wednesday, Columbus Interim Chief of Police Michael Woods held a briefing about the incident, played the two 911 call recordings in relation to the incident and released HD video of the bodycam footage first seen Tuesday evening.
The first 911 call confirmed that the caller was concerned about a potential stabbing happening, and in the background, you can hear shouting.
The footage from the body camera and footage from the other officers on scene confirm the previously reported details about the Makiya Bryant being armed with a knife and attempting to stab another person at the scene.
Earlier Tuesday, White House Press Secretary blamed systemic racism for the police shooting. "So our focus is on working to address systemic racism and implicit bias head-on, and of course to passing laws and legislation that will put much needed reforms into place in police departments around the country."
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