On Friday, August 10, 100 people from Occupy Wichita and the local community gathered together at Hillside and 21st Street before marching to the city's central police department. A PA system faced the police department, and the microphone was opened for families to tell the police their grievances. Fathers, mothers, wives, brothers, sisters, cousins, lovers and children spoke their piece.

“You are out here taking innocent people's lives for no reason,” said Shakeitha Scales, mother to Timothy Freeborn Collins Jr., an alleged gang member who at 17 was fired upon and killed by police in April after exiting the backdoor of his house with his hands up in surrender.

Since October 2011, the Wichita Police Department has shot and killed five people, often under dubious circumstances. The department’s handling of these cases can best be characterized by a marked lack of transparency and blatant disrespect towards the families of the victims.

Photo 1: Troy Lanning, Jr., killed by Wichita police. Photo 2: Marquez Smart, killed by Wichita police. Photo 3: DeJuan Colbert, killed by Wichita police. Photo 4: Karen Day Jackson, killed by Wichita police.

One seasoned journalist, who prefers not to be named, said that he has reported the news in several states and has never seen a police department conceal so much information in regards to police-involved shootings. Most states convene grand juries to publicly investigate all police shootings, but the Kansas Bureau of Investigations handles inquiries and does so privately. The Wichita Police Department never reveals the names of officers who have shot and killed suspects.

Police killings are not an anomaly. In the United States, police kill over 7,000 citizens each year. Activists from Anaheim and Baltimore announced through social media that their police force has killed their citizens unjustly, and the police departments continue to defend the actions of their police forces.

In Wichita, Chief Norman Williams stated in press conference on July 11, "When you look at each one of those situations, the officer gave commands for people to obey; to drop their weapons, to comply with what's going on. And they chose not to."

In other words: blame the victim.

“We just wish people would comply with the instructions that’s given them by the officers," he went on, "because, at the end of the day, you go to jail, you get out, you move on.”

Williams said this in a press conference about the death of Karen Day Jackson, and admitted that the number of shootings was disturbing, yet continued to defend the actions of the police force.

Norman Williams has a history of police brutality in his early career. One would expect him to defend his police force whether they are in the right or in the wrong.

In each case the stories of the police do not match the stories you find on the street. Witnesses to the events, testimonies from friends and family, and even autopsy reports – once released – indicate that the police protect their own before they protect the people. One can submit a Kansas Open Record Act request to obtain documents related to the shootings, but the police can by law deny these requests because of pending investigations. The police remain silent to the families who have to perform their own investigations to find out what happened to their kin.

Norman Williams stated that Karen Day Jackson had stabbed herself repeatedly before charging the police with that same knife. Derek Jackson, who was at the scene of the crime, stated that her body had no stab wounds and that she was not carrying a knife. Tyra Williams, her daughter, stated that she had a laceration on her arm. In either case, the story does not match the police who claim she was repeatedly stabbing herself in a frenzy. Police killed her on July 10, 2012.

Police claim Dejuan Colbert had a weapon on his person and was threatening them. The street story says that he dropped the weapon before he was shot 12 to 13 times. Police killed him on October 30, 2011.

Troy Lanning Jr. fled after a police chase which was initiated on the basis of the color of his car. Lanning feared the police because his previous incarceration, which was the result of a Romeo and Juliet scenario – he was 17, his girlfriend was 15. The family knew he had problems, but Lanning had a change of heart. Just before the shooting Lanning looked for work diligently, and spoke of going to church the following Sunday. But Sunday never came for him since the police killed him on April 1, 2012.

In the case of Marquez Smart, police claim that Smart fired at them and then they shot back. This was within a crowd of people running from the police, due to regular police harassment of the black community as they come out of the clubs in Wichita’s Old Town. Police say that Marquez had joined a gang. The family states that he was a hardworking individual that identified as “prep”. And the autopsy report states that all the bullets entered Marquez from behind. He was running away. Police killed him on March 10, 2012.

“We pay tax dollars for you to have tazers, but you use guns,” said Earnest LaShawn Day, son of Karen Day Jackson, at the Occupy Wichita action outside police headquarters on Friday.

“I was downtown doing my own investigation," said Randal Smart, father to Marquez. "The police come up behind us talking to us like we're little kids. They threatened to arrest us. I said, you're probably the one who shot my son, and he said no I wasn't but I wish I had."

“Why'd you kill my grandma?” asked the grandchildren of Karen Day Jackson.

This week, Occupy Wichita and the community will be strengthening their ties on this issue. Occupy Wichita has arranged to to the city council about setting up a citizen's review board. The people of Wichita have spoken: they will not step down until justice is served for these murders and Wichita adopts procedures to ensure that they don't continue.