More than 60 bullets struck Mr. Walker, according to early autopsy reports. Akron Mayor Dan Horrigan said he was “outraged and shocked” by what happened during the traffic stop and called on community members to remain calm and await a full investigation into the incident. “I urge all of our residents, reserve your full judgment until the investigation is complete,” Mr. Horrigan told the news conference. “You’re going to have to do one of the hardest things I can ask anyone to do and that’s be patient.” During Sunday’s presentation, Akron police played footage from officers’ body cameras and state highway cameras of the encounter. Police say Walker fled an attempted traffic stop in the early hours of Monday morning, leading police on a car chase. As officers gave chase in their cruisers, officials say police heard and saw a gunshot from Walker’s car. At Sunday’s press conference, officers played video from a highway traffic camera showing a grainy image of a flash coming from Walker’s car. “Shots fired, this vehicle just had a shot come out of its door,” an officer can be heard saying on the body camera footage. Attorneys for Walker’s family say they have seen no evidence Jayland fired at police. A loaded handgun was found in the front seat of the 25-year-old’s car. Body camera footage then captures a team of eight officers chasing Walker through a parking lot as he begins to run away on foot. According to police, officers initially tried to use a Taser on the 25-year-old. Walker then “stopped and turned quickly” toward the officers. Believing him to be armed, they fired countless shots at the man, police said, even though Walker was actually unarmed at the time of the foot chase. Lawyer Bobby DiCello, who represents Mr Walker’s family, said he was horrified by the video “In my 22 years of litigating, both as a former Cuyahoga County District Attorney and as a civil rights attorney in many serious cases involving the use of deadly force, I have never seen anything like this in my life. It’s very, very concerning,” Mr. DiCello told the Akron Beacon Journal. The lawyer said the video was “unbelievable” and “violent” but called on members of the community to heed Mr Walker’s demands to keep the ongoing protests peaceful. “We are all preparing for the community response and the only message we have is that the family does not need any more violence,” he said. “… He needs peace, he wants peace, and he wants the process to evolve.” Community members have been protesting the shooting for days. “When some people don’t follow the instructions, they get handcuffed,” Hamza Khabir of the activist group Law Enforcement Equality Reform told The New York Times. “When black people do that, they end up getting shot and killed.” The city canceled a planned Fourth of July celebration in light of the shooting. “He was my little nephew,” Mr. Walker’s aunt, Lajuana Walker Dawkins, said at a news conference on Thursday. “And we miss him. We just want some answers.” An unspecified number of Akron police officers have been placed on administrative leave since the shooting. The Akron Police Department and the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation are investigating the shooting and will turn their findings over to the Ohio Attorney General’s Office.
