By Lucas Sullivan, The Columbus Dispatch, and staff
COLUMBUS – Mayor Andrew J. Ginther has deployed his community relations staff to the Linden neighborhood and held meetings with clergy members to calm tensions after police fatally shot Henry Green in South Linden.
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Sean Walton, the attorney for Green’s family, said this week that the city is “aggressively targeting” young black men and that the mayor’s plan to quell violence this summer is building distrust.
More than two dozen church leaders met Sunday and asked the administration to conduct a separate investigation from the police department.
Green, 23, was walking with a friend at about 6:30 p.m. on June 6 in South Linden when two Columbus police officers in civilian clothes and riding in an unmarked white SUV encountered them. Police said they saw Green holding a gun.
From there the police account and that of Green’s friend, who witnessed the shooting, differ.
Police said they ordered Green to drop the weapon. Green then fired a shot at officers Jason Bare and Zachary Rosen, who shot back, killing Green.
Green’s family and the friend walking with him said the officers did not identify themselves when they began yelling at Green. They said Green was doing nothing illegal when officers approached him. It is legal in Ohio to carry a gun openly.
The shooting is the first racially charged moment in the early days of Ginther’s administration. Ginther has made it a focus of his administration to address issues in the black community including poverty, infant deaths and unemployment.