Faces: 5 and 6

Whether you agree with how to officers handled the situation or not, (see story here), it effects the community, so I went downtown to take a picture of the friends and relatives of Elip Cheatham today.  They're upset over a ruling four days ago that the officers will not be found criminal negligible in that fatal shooting.

I'm not going to take sides here, as I feel for everyone in this instance, and my purpose in this project is simply to document people in our community.  I feel for the officers who felt that they needed to do what they did to protect themselves.  Whether it was justified or not, taking a life is something that is going to be hard for them to live with.  But I also feel for those who lost a friend or relative in Elip Cheatham, and can understand their need to do something to express their feelings of loss and anger.

I'll be posting a couple more of their photos tomorrow, since I took too many for one post today.  I said 30 people in 30 days, after all, and didn't specifically say they had to be taken on consecutive days.  How's that for a loophole?

OK.  Here's the group:

This is Katherine-Anne.  She was interesting to talk with.  She told me about her name, how in the villages in Ireland every girl seems to be named Katherine (Kate, Kat, Kitty...), so the parents tack on an extra name to tell all the girls apart!

And this is Katrina, who lost her uncle in the shooting.

It's easy for people to judge, whether to judge the police or judge Elip.  But behind every policeman and every Elip, there's the face of a family member or friend who is left dealing with consequences and loss, and my heart goes out to them as they struggle to come to terms with what happened that day.

Tomorrow?  Gary and Jim.  Sorry guys--can you be patient for another day?  :)  I promise it'll be worth the wait--the photos look great!

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