a jury said he s not guilty. but obviously, even today, there are many people that don t see it that way. gervonn: after the trial, people were just so angry, so distraught, just so hurt. it just seemed like it just cracked open this great utopia. and it was devastating. so i think we buried that. it was so painful. (music) thelma: after the trial, i couldn t take it no more, so i just left. and now i try to avoid that town because phillip loved teaneck. he d know every place and he d know every street, everything in teaneck. he loved teaneck, new jersey. he loved it. he died in a town that he loved. (music) natacha: after the trial, my whole childhood was gone. i felt stigmatized. when people saw me, it s like they would get sad because i would automatically put them in mind.
we don t have to say a word. you re doing it. you re going back on the things that we talk about in these meetings. jim: i still want something on behalf of the council, i would ask you to propose other things, too. gervonn: it was such an interesting phenomena about not wanting to address something so painful. but the only way you can really heal is to be able to acknowledge it. acknowledge that it s part of our history. good, bad or indifferent, it s part of teaneck s history. and to be able to continue to heal from that. jim: at this point, i m going to put a little moratorium on discussing this mural. natacha: that angered me, you know, and i was like, my brother s been dead for 30 years and he can t harm anyone. he was a 16 year old kid that was killed in teaneck s backyard. and you still don t want to acknowledge that this happened to him. (music)
natacha: to see how much support that s actually out here today in honor of my brother s life is amazing to me. thelma: i just want to thank the town of teaneck for the tree of healing for my son in his name. it s been a long, long time coming. a long time coming. now we re going to let these balloons go in phillip pannell s name. rest in heaven, phillip, let it go. male: happy birthday, phillip. this is for you. (music) much love, phillip pannell. (clapping) natacha: yeah. happy birthday, clint. hallelujah. yeah. thelma: i can t explain it. it s something that lifts from my heart. it s just like this, i can get some sleep tonight. thank you, jesus. i can go to sleep. i can go to sleep. just from planting a tree, we got to go through this hell. just for doing a tree. a tree!
and the hurt that she was dealing with in that moment and the cheers that the police officers let out. to this day, it s tough because you re celebrating the release of your fellow police officer. but the reason for the verdict is my child s death, and you cheering that. so, there was just no empathy there. walter: hearing the anguish of phillip s mother, put into proper context the reality of black life in america. that you can kill a black person. a jury can hear the evidence and let the person walk. and the family has to deal with it. and so what? batron: the system didn t work. the system s broke. you know the system s not for a black man. i just couldn t understand. like, if a man or a person getting shot in the back and you don t see no wrong with that, you know. i don t understand that. natacha: as we were leaving, it was such a crazy feeling and so bizarre.
natacha: we presented a design to them and it had my brother s name in the middle of one of the letters, and they was like, oh no, we re opposed of this because it has full pannell s name on it. when we asked them why, and they said that there are people to this day who are on the opposing side that believes that, you know, spath was justified. jim: one of the things that we were concerned about was an emphasis on names because we wanted something that we felt would bring together the township. elie: i think that there are a lot of people in this community that still feel the divisions, and i did not want this to be a divisive statement. i wanted this to be a uniting statement. so i m opposed to any of the names. gervonn: they didn t want the names. they didn t want phillip pannell s name on there, as if such a history would put a tarnish on teaneck s image. and then somebody just jumped up and said, well, let s rename a street after it. michael: one thing we can do to take another