FRIENDS & FAMILY MARCH FOR JUSTICE FOR JARRELL GARRIS WHO WAS FATALLY SHOT BY NRPD DETECTIVE STEPHEN CONN

BY AJ WOODSON

Friends and family of Jarrell Garris marched from Starbucks in Wykagyl on North Avenue to the New Rochelle Police Department on Friday, July 21st to honor his life. The 37-year-old unarmed Black man was shot and killed by New Rochelle Detective Stephan Conn.

Bodycam footage released by the NRPD shows officers and a detective confronting Garris on Lincoln Avenue and asking about stolen food on July 3. Police say Garris reached at one of the officer’s guns, which is when Garris was shot, but all three body cam videos shut off before the fatal shot and controdict the department’s statement.

Family members told Black Westchester, Garris suffered from mental illness, and that police in the area knew of him. They are demanding Det. Conn be fired.

“Tonight, I’m really praying for unity and that people that see this march understand that this could be your son, this can be your dad, this can be your sister, this can be your brother,” said Reverend Jamel Hollis. “It’s going to be important everybody get involved.”

All three of the officers have been placed on paid administrative leave.

“I promise you on everything I love, I ain’t goin nowhere, I’m gonna stand on thesse right here (pointing to his feet), I standing ten toes down, I ain’t going nowhere until we get justice for my son,” Raymond Fowler, father of Jarrel (pictured above) said on the steps on the New Rochelle Police Department located at 475 North Avenue, after the march. “Yall gotta be mindful, there think we’re gonna tear up shit, we gonna beat em with this (he says pointing to his brain), and their own law. Cause they know they violated my son’s human rights, they killed him like an animal. [Detective] Stephen Conn is a coward. Anytime you hear the code word gun, that means shoot, that’s what that is, thats the code word for shoot. You got a taser, you got pepperspray and you wanted to shoot him, why? Shoot him and paralyze him instantly. Monday I meet with the AG, but it don’t even matter cause at the end of the day I know who the best of planners is, it ain’t mankind, Allah is the best planner, God is the best planner and that’s who I put my faith and my trust in. they tried to smear my son talking about his charges, what about Steve Conn’s charges? How th ehell he end up being a police officer? Huh? You got an assualt charge, you shooting up dogs and you still become an officer? How do you serve and protect, how is that possible? If anybody need a psych evalution, its Steve Conn. On June 9th they promoted him to Dectective. So as a dectective you are supposed to de-esculate the situation, not esculate it and thats what he did. Show all the video, show all the body cam, dont edit that shit out, let’s see all of it, show all of it. they claimed my son reached for a gun, show when yall are beating my son before you shot him. They’r enot going to do that. They are trying to paint this false narrative. Thats why I made it my business to be here today and thats why I made it business to be there when it first happened, And I aint going nowhere, as long as I have breath in my body, regardless of what the decision is, I know the law and I’m gonna do what I gotta do.” (“And we gonan be here with you,” shouted out the crowd)

“As a community, we can’t accept it,” said New Rochelle NAACP Acting President Aisha Cook at the start of the march. “We need to be out here, we need to be in force and we need to make sure that everybody knows that we do not stand for it, it’s not ok.

Distressing bodycam video captured the moment police in Westchester County fatally shot a man accused of stealing fruit – which his father described as a “modern-day lynching.”

Three New Rochelle cops — identified as Kari Bird, Gabrielle Chavarry and Detective Steven Conn — confronted Jarrell Garris, 37, at a grocery store on July 3. Detective Conn fired one round, which hit Garris in the neck and impacted his cervical spine and spinal cord, the Westchester County Medical Examiner’s Office said July 12.

Garris remained in a coma and was taken off life support on July 10. His death was ruled a homicide and is being investigated by the state Attorney General’s Office.

The AG’s Office of Special Investigation takes over when a police officer may have caused a person’s death, according to state law. Stay tuned to Black Westchester for updates on this case!

BY PRISCILLA ECHI

“Oh Ella...” the name even rolls of the tongue eloquently. What the First Lady of Song did for music in the early 20’s has allowed us to still bow at the mere mention of her name 100 years later.

How did she end up on School St. you ask?? Well, after her father William and Mother Temperance (Tempie) went their separate ways Ella and her mother migrated to Yonkers to a mostly mixed neighborhood. She made friends easily because she was very personable and kind but it’s wasn’t to be taken taken for weakness. Ella moonlighted as a runner for local gamblers, socially conscious yet unruly enough to pick up bets and drop off the cash without fear.

This fed her tomboy-ish demeanor. It’s also gave her the hutzpah needed to navigate the predominantly testosterone fueled industry.

Jazz and Blues was so much more than performances at smoke filled speakeasies with corset drawn foxes strutting on stages.

It was a sophisticated harmonic sound that became immortal and defined an entire era called “The Jazz Age”. New York, became the quintessential melting pot for budding Jazz stars.

What better place than Yonkers NY.

BY AJ WOODSON

Mount Vernon’s Nina Simone, who would’ve celebrated her 86th birthday this year, was known for using her musical platform to speak out. “I think women play a major part in opening the doors for better understanding around the world,” the “Strange Fruit” songstress once said. Though she chose to keep her personal life shrouded in secrecy, these facts grant VIP access into a life well-lived and the music that still lives on.

At the age of 12, Simone refused to play at a church revival because her parents had to sit at the back of the hall. From then on, Simone used her art to take a stand. Many of her songs in the ‘60s, including “Mississippi Goddamn,” “Why (The King of Love Is Dead),” and “Young, Gifted and Black,” addressed the rampant racial injustices of that era.

As one can imagine, her activism wasn’t always welcome. Her popularity diminished; venues didn’t invite her to perform, and radio stations didn’t play her songs. But she pressed on—even after the Civil Rights Movement. In 1997, Simone told Interview Magazine that she addressed her songs to the third world. In her own words: “I’m a real rebel with a cause.”

“Mississippi Goddam,” her 1964 anthem, only took her 20 minutes to an hour to write, according to legend—but it made an impact that still stands the test of time. When she wrote it, Simone had been fed up with the country’s racial unrest. Medger Evers, a Mississippi-born civil rights activist, was assassinated in his home state in 1963. That same year, the Ku Klux Klan bombed a Birmingham Baptist church and as a result, four young black girls were killed. Simone took to her notebook and piano to express her sentiments.

It molded her whisper to scat vocals that ranged in songs of heartache, preserverance, and romance and captivated the entire globe.

In the 20’s... to have won 13 Grammy awards, and sold over 40 million albums was unheard of. Especially for an African American— and, a woman at that! With a face that held the image of a saint and voice that could imitate the instrument in a 12 peice orchestra,

It’s no surprise all the jazz greats, from Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Nat King Cole, Sinatra, Dizzy Gillespie had the honor of working with her. She packed venues worldwide to the boarders with a sultry voice that drew you close as a baby suckling from its mother.

“Oh no... They can’t take that away from me” fittingly describes her unmatched legacy. The equivalency present day would by far surpass all of the modern day greats combined. There is no one that could even come close.

Oh Ella...

*Do yourself a favor and got to YouTube and search “Non Stop Ella 2.5 hrs Ella Fitzgerald and just get in the car and drive* .... thank me later