On February 16, 2022, 15-year-old Martell Williams was called to the principal’s office. He didn’t know why. But suddenly, two police officers pulled him out of school and into an interrogation room – with sinister intentions.
After attempting to BRIBE the teenager with McDonalds, Waukegan, Illinois police coerced Williams into a false confession by lying to him that if he did, he could finally go home! Instead, Williams spent two nights in jail, and was looking at 10 to 20 YEARS.
But this is how his community stepped in to save him from that fate.
Williams’ family found video of him at a basketball game 17 miles away from the scene of the shooting he was being accused of! Friends uncovered a screenshot from Snapchat to corroborate that evidence. Their investigative work freed Williams, but that says a lot about the criminal “justice” system.
In 2021, Illinois became the first state to ban police from lying to minors during interrogations. So how did this still happen? Why did Williams’ school let police detain him without notifying his parents? And why didn’t police search for this evidence themselves?
The simple answer is: they don’t care. Like Williams' community that came together to crack his case, we have to build strong Black communities to protect ourselves. The best defense against white supremacist policing is us!