Family of Owings Mills man killed by Michigan police demands release of unedited video

Karyn Kirby says you can guess how her Mother’s Day went, after her first-born son was fatally shot by police weeks earlier. You can probably also guess how Thursday, what would’ve been her son’s 22nd birthday, will go for her.

The Maryland woman remains in Michigan, searching for answers weeks after her son, Isaiah Kirby, a Michigan State University student, was fatally shot by East Lansing Police Department officers on April 15. The family and their attorney spoke at a news conference Tuesday that revealed frustrations in the East Lansing community with the Police Department’s use of force.

“I don’t ask for nothing else. I just want to know what happened behind my baby as to why he is no longer on this Earth breathing,” Karyn Kirby said at the news conference, which was livestreamed from East Lansing.

East Lansing Police said in a news release that officers were responding to a theft at a business shortly after 6 p.m. on April 15, which led them to a nearby nonfatal stabbing. Police shot the suspect in the stabbing, whom authorities said was Kirby, 21, of Owings Mills.

He was weeks away from receiving a degree in zoology from Michigan State.

Police officials said Thursday that they would release the body-worn camera footage from the officers involved at a later date than expected. This came after the family and their attorney expressed disappointment in what they called the “highly edited” video they were shown and called for the release of raw footage.

Teresa A. Caine Bingman, the Kirby family’s attorney, said Tuesday that the video they saw was “sketchy, deceiving and misleading.” Across what Bingman called scattered scenes, she said they were shown a man whom police said was Isaiah Kirby with his hands up, revealing a phone in one hand and a cup and another object in the other. A later zoomed-in image showed a person’s lifeless hand holding a bloody knife.

“We certainly saw a stabbing victim, but this stabbing that they’re accusing Isaiah of, we did not see him stabbing anyone. We did not even see a weapon in the hand of the person who was purported to be Isaiah. The face was blacked out,” Bingman said. “We don’t know who injured the man, but we need facts, and we will gather those facts and follow the evidence from there.”

In addition to unedited video footage, she and the family are demanding full transparency from both local and state police agencies, an independent and unbiased investigation, accountability for any unlawful actions, and justice for Isaiah.

Bingman and Karyn Kirby said the Michigan State and East Lansing police departments are “playing the blame game,” redirecting the family and their attorney to the other agency when asked questions. Michigan State Police are investigating the shooting.

“We are not commenting on our investigation or any videos of the incident. Once our investigation is complete, we will forward our report to the prosecutor’s office or AG’s office,” Rene Gonzalez, a spokesperson for the Michigan State Police, said in an email.

East Lansing officials said Tuesday they will release a narrated timeline of the officer-involved shooting, redacted body-worn camera and fleet footage and aid being rendered to the stabbing victim and Isaiah Kirby later this week. Officials said East Lansing Police do not have footage of the stabbing, video from local businesses or anything from other agencies, including Michigan State Police.

Community concerns about police

A day before Isaiah Kirby was fatally shot, James McCurtis, the president of the Lansing branch of the NAACP, had called on East Lansing Police Chief Jennifer Brown and City Manager Robert Belleman to resign due to officers’ “excessive use of force” in a separate incident.

On Aug. 24, during Michigan State’s Welcome Week, East Lansing Police officers pepper-sprayed and arrested Lonnie Smith, 21, and Mason Woods, 22, for allegedly fighting and disturbing the peace after an altercation outside a restaurant. In an interview with local news station WLNS, Brown, who is a Michigan State University alum, said transients in the area were “disruptive” during the week of college festivities.

“We have a very transient population, and over the last month, starting with Welcome Weekend, we have had a disproportionate number of minorities come into the community and commit crimes, and as police officers we are simply responding to those crimes,” Brown told the local news station.

The incident and Brown’s comments, among other concerns, prompted the East Lansing Independent Police Oversight Commission to call for Brown’s resignation last October. Other organizations, including the NAACP Lansing branch, made a similar call.

“We all know what happened to George Floyd. Does a similar tragedy have to happen here before you act?” McCurtis said before the City Council on April 14.

McCurtis stood with Isaiah Kirby’s family and attorneys on Tuesday, seeking transparency and urging attendees to get politically engaged.

“The City Council needs to be replaced. East Lansing has to clean house,” McCurtis said. “The only way to clean it is for you to vote.”

On Monday, WLNS reported that the East Lansing Human Rights Commission upheld its April 13 finding that the Police Department discriminated against Smith and Woods. Representatives from the East Lansing Police Department and the city of East Lansing did not immediately respond to requests for comment.