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Ma’Khia Bryant was charging at two young women with a knife, police body camera video footage shows, when an officer arrived and fatally shot her outside the foster home she had been living in for about two months.
Ma’Khia’s foster mother Angela Moore, who wasn’t home at the time, said the dispute stemmed from an argument over a messy house and an unmade bed between Ma’Khia and some of Moore’s former foster children who had come to the house to throw Moore a birthday party. At least two of the women involved in the altercation were adults ages 20 and 22, according to a police report.
Ma Khia Bryant was 13 years old when Columbus police removed her and three siblings from their mother s home and placed them in the emergency care of Franklin County Children Services in March 2018.
Three years and one month later, on April 20, Ma Khia was still in the agency s custody when a Columbus police officer fatally shot her outside the foster home where she lived in the 3100 block of Legion Lane on the Far East Side.
The initial reaction to the death of the 16-year-old girl was outrage among community members who have grown weary of police killings of Black people.
But in the days since the shooting, attention increasingly has turned to questions and allegations regarding the child welfare system, specifically Ohio s foster-care system, and whether it played a role in the tragedy.
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COLUMBUS, Ohio â Rallies in the wake of MaâKhia Bryantâs death continued Saturday as a crowd gathered on the steps of City Hall to decry police brutality and demand change while listening to a host of speakers, including the girl s mother, Paula Bryant.
Bryant described her daughter â a 16-year-old who was shot and killed by a Columbus police officer on April 20 â as an honor roll student who loved the color blue and TikTok hairstyle videos. She had a great sense of humor and was kind to anyone she met, she said.
âShe had a beautiful smile, was loving and had a beautiful personality,â she told those gathered, many of whom wore neon butterfly hair clips in honor of MaâKhia. âShe was a protector and had a motherly spirit about her.â