GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — The Grand Rapids Police Department says a 26-year-old man was shot by a police officer who has been with the department for nearly seven years.
Tatiyana Walker lives right across the street from where the man was shot, near Griggs Street SE and Nelson Ave SE. She's lived in the house on and off since she was 8 years old, but has never seen anything like this happen in the neighborhood before.
"I was here as a kid," says Walker. "Had fun, played in the neighborhood, wasn't a big deal."
But that changed on Monday morning.
"I heard a pop noise," describes Walker. "And, you know, I'm familiar with a gunshot. So I know what it sounds like."
Walker and her partner immediately went to check out their front windows.
"It was right across the street, right over there by that wooden fence," she says. "He was on the ground, just laying there, and the cops were in the street."
She felt shocked by what she was seeing.
"I just kept looking out the window thinking, like, wow, that really happened," says Walker. "I don't think that I was scared or anything. I just was really surprised. And I felt really bad. Because my first thought was, like, that's someone's family."
She started recording with her phone, the video showing officers with their guns drawn while the victim laid motionless in the yard.
"He was face down, not moving or anything," recalls Walker.
In the nine-minute video, officers did not approach the suspect for more than two minutes, and then began administering CPR.
In a press conference Monday afternoon, Grand Rapids Police Chief Eric Winstrom said the officer who shot the suspect had his body camera fall off.
"I can't tell you how it fell off, I do know that there was a lengthy struggle," says Winstrom. "I'm told it was over a minute and a half or two minutes of fighting."
Walker started filming soon after she heard the gunshot.
"I wish that, you know, I had been there a couple minutes sooner to be able to see what had happened," says Walker.
Wishing she could see the beginning of the struggle, because the GRPD's account of events doesn't sit right with her.
"I find it hard to trust the stories you know, things like that," says Walker. "Body cam fell off and whatnot, that's just very convenient."
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