Nicholas Heyward Sr.’s son, Nicholas Jr., was 13 years old in 1994, playing with friends in the Gowanus Houses where he lived when an NYPD housing officer mistook the toy gun the teenager was holding for a real gun and shot him in the building’s stairwell.
It’s been 22 years since the shooting, and Heyward still sometimes speaks about his son in the present tense.
For much of those two decades, Heyward has pushed to get “justice” for his son, he says. Today, that push is part of a broader movement — including family members and supporters of Akai Gurley, who was shot and killed by a police officer in a stairwell, too.
That case, like Heyward’s, demonstrates the complicated road to resolution, even in a climate more receptive to the simple idea that black and brown children, men and women shouldn’t be in danger from the police officers sworn to protect them.
Fueled by memory
Heyward remembers seeing his son on one of the benches dotting the Gowanus Houses, chatting with a senior citizen from the community — “having an adult conversation.” The younger Heyward was often practicing basketball in the park, hoping to play for his school team.
Not long after Nicholas Jr. was killed, Heyward found out his son had made the team.
The officer, who was African-American, was “nervous,” says Heyward. The stairwell was dark enough that the officer said he had his flashlight out — similar to the “dimly lit” stairwell where Gurley was shot by Officer Peter Liang, who has been dismissed from the NYPD.
The officer who killed Heyward’s son was not indicted. Eventually, Heyward settled a civil suit for a small amount, but the officer remained on the force.
Heyward pushed continually for further investigation, but then-Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes resisted. He had more hope when Ken Thompson succeeded Hynes.
Thompson had worked on the prosecution team in the Abner Louima case, and ran on a platform of reform. He argued that Hynes’ tenure was littered with wrongful convictions and inattention to minority communities and promised to do better.
Heyward says he “had faith in Thompson,” who “worked hard for justice” and supported programs to build up communities, rather than locking residents up. He lobbied Thompson to look at his son’s case. Last fall, the Brooklyn DA’s civil rights bureau began reviewing the case. That review is ongoing.
The evolving fight for justice
That small success was indicative of a new moment: the year before, Heyward had taken to the streets with thousands protesting the deaths of Eric Garner in Staten Island and Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.
In the 90s, Heyward worked with civil rights leaders and advocates such as the Rev. Herbert Daughtry, who remembers the letters, news conferences, and appeals that fell on deaf ears of elected officials.
Daughtry says he protested President Jimmy Carter’s visit to City Hall in the ’70s, never getting a response. He says he grabbed the microphone at an event with Ed Koch soon after Koch won the mayoral race, finagling a meeting with the new police commissioner that never resulted in changes.
Now, some DAs and even the president are paying attention to police shootings, and social media organizes protesters and preserves evidence. Heyward, who has long worked with families of police violence victims, is now supporting Gurley’s family, too. When that case resulted in an indictment and ultimately a conviction, Heyward was in attendance at the courtroom, often crying.
Justice meets politics
Last week, Thompson took a position on Liang’s sentencing, scheduled for April 14, that seemed to contradict his earlier aggressive prosecution.
Thompson’s statement explained that Liang, who had been found guilty of manslaughter and official misconduct, was not a danger to his community and therefore should serve probation, not jail time. He said the sentence must follow the particulars of the case, and serve justice, not revenge.
The recommendation was greeted with shock and anger by Gurley’s family and supporters. Heyward was once again outside the Brooklyn courthouse, standing with the family.
“It didn’t make sense,” he said afterward. Now he was worried that Thompson might not do the “proper investigation” in his son’s case, which he felt hadn’t been done by Hynes.
It will be an uphill investigation. The only possible charge is murder, always difficult to prove, and even harder after so much time has lapsed. Prosecution for manslaughter, as in Liang’s case, is barred by the statute of limitations.
Heyward might very well find himself as dissatisfied with the workings of justice, once again, as Gurley’s family does now.
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