MADISON, Wis. — Two rallies were planned Wednesday over the shooting of an unarmed biracial man by a white police officer, one to protest the slaying and another in support of law enforcement, as the investigation continues into what led to the killing Friday night at an apartment near downtown.
Likely Republican presidential candidate Gov. Scott Walker also became directly involved Wednesday, meeting with a leader in Madison’s black community who has been working as a liaison for family members of the slain 19-year-old.
Boys and Girls Club of Dane County leader Michael Johnson said on Facebook that he had a “great meeting” with Walker and he would give more details in the afternoon.
“We have several commitments and he listened to me for about 15 min and then we exchanged thoughts,” Johnson said on Facebook.
Walker’s spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a message seeking details about the meeting. Johnson also did not return a message.
Tony Robinson was shot and killed by police officer Matt Kenny early Friday evening while investigating a call that the young man was jumping in and out of traffic and had assaulted someone. The officer heard a disturbance and forced his way into an apartment where Robinson had gone. Authorities said Kenny fired after Robinson assaulted him.
Protests since the shooting have been large and peaceful, with Robinson’s family members saying they are not anti-police and organizers of rallies broadening their focus to include larger issues related to racial justice.
Madison city officials, most notably the mayor and police chief — who are both white — have been outspoken in supporting the rights of those upset over the shooting. Police Chief Michael Koval expressed sorrow over the shooting and Mayor Paul Soglin has repeatedly said that the unrest that followed a similar shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, was not inevitable in Madison.
“We’re a pretty good city, we’re not perfect, but I would say our response since Friday night is as caring and understanding as we could want,” Soglin said at a news conference Monday.
The biggest rally to date came Monday when about 1,500 people, many of them high school students, gathered peacefully over the noon hour filling the rotunda of the state Capitol. The Madison school district facilitated students’ participation in the event, providing buses for anyone who wanted to take part.
Students were also invited to attend another march Wednesday afternoon that was to start at the state Department of Corrections headquarters to demand fully funded public schools, a living wage for every Wisconsin worker, and “systemic change so that communities of color can live free of mass incarceration and police violence.”
That rally was in the works before the shooting, said organizer Jennifer Epps-Addison, director of the advocacy group Wisconsin Jobs Now.
Marchers planned two additional stops, ending with the delivery of their demands to Walker.
Epps-Addison said the march will not go to the Capitol, the planned site of a pro-police rally that was to begin two hours after the one protesting the shooting.
A Facebook group called “We Stand With the Madison Police Department” scheduled what was billed as “Peaceful Gathering (hash)1” at a law enforcement memorial outside the Capitol. That is the first organized rally in support of police.
The rallies come as the state Department of Criminal Investigation, a part of the Wisconsin Department of Justice, continues its independent review of the shooting as is required under state law whenever a police officer kills someone.
