Here & Now

Frederica Freyberg:
It continues to be a tough week for a Madison community and the city’s police department after a deadly police shooting in a neighborhood where it has happened before. Some public events are on hold and parts of one community remain shut down. “Here & Now” reporter Murv Seymour takes us to the front line with details.

Man with bullhorn:
We are going to scream his name. Justice for…

Crowd:
Corey!

Man with bullhorn:
Justice for…

Crowd:
Corey!

Murv Seymour:
For more than a week and counting, echoes of anger and frustration continue to ring out in and around the East Side neighborhood where Corey Ruiz was shot and killed during a scuffle with four Madison police officers.

Man with bullhorn:
This is not a time to be uncouth. This is a time to come together and be neighbors.

Murv Seymour:
The high-profile shooting is in the early phases of being investigated by the state Department of Justice, overseen by Attorney General Josh Kaul.

Lorien Carter:
It started as just someone came and painted on the road, and flowers and candles were placed there. And then it eventually started to grow.

Murv Seymour:
This 12-foot-tall traveling monument represents outrage and solidarity against police brutality. First set up in Minneapolis after George Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis police officer, the raised fist now sits in the center of the street at a popular intersection in Madison. It’s the very spot where Corey Ruiz’s deadly encounter with police was caught on cell phone video, sparking national attention, outrage and the nation’s most known civil rights attorney, Benjamin Crump, to come to Madison to represent the family.

Natalie Love Church:
I love this city and I love these people. And this is awful.

Murv Seymour:
Natalie Love Church lights candles, others bring cards, some place flowers. Most everyone takes a moment to pause and process what’s happening here. Natalie tells me she’s come to pay her respects and to demand accountability.

Natalie Love Church:
Justice looks like there’s a system that’s in place, a justice system in place and this was not it. Accountability needs to be taken and justice for this poor person. I don’t care if he was guilty as hell. I don’t care. This was not it. This was not justice.

Murv Seymour:
What started out as a memorial has morphed into a movement to help those who are a lot like Corey Ruiz: unhoused and in need of mental health and social services support. Jazzman Brown tells me at last count, nearly 50 tents have been provided, allowing some to camp out on the streets. A temporary fix to a complex housing problem, a touch of comfort and hope to a community that needs it now more than ever.

Jazzman Brown:
We all know that he was homeless and that he had his struggles. And how could we not, you know, in the place where he was killed, in the neighborhood where homelessness is so high, help those that, you know, were in the exact same situation he was. So we’ve built a space for everyone.

Murv Seymour:
One of the lead organizers of this space, Lorien Carter, says if there’s one thing this memorial represents, it’s hope.

Lorien Carter:
This is affecting all of us. This is something that’s in your backyard and a proximity to whiteness doesn’t equal immunity. We’ve seen it in real time now. And so I think that — I think that the country has to acknowledge that there is a race problem.

Murv Seymour:
She and others want the police officer to be charged with murder, which will ultimately be the decision of the Dane County district attorney once the DOJ completes its investigation.

Lorien Carter:
Please stop telling us to heal when you keep reopening the same wounds.

Murv Seymour:
The police shooting of Corey Ruiz opens old wounds for Lorien and others. Just over ten years ago, just a few blocks from here, a Madison police officer shot and killed Lorien’s unarmed nephew Tony Robinson.

Mike Weber:
Yeah, but I have a right to be here just like you do, man.

Man:
But you have a right to peacefully protest somewhere else though. This is not — this place is not for that.

Murv Seymour:
The sense of peace here was briefly interrupted over Mike Weber’s right to support the Madison Police Department. Weber tells me he also wants accountability.

Mike Weber:
I’m not judging him one way or the other. You know, if when the results of the investigation come in, I might change my mind. I don’t know, but I want to see people be cool until that happens.

Woman with bullhorn:
What do we want?

Protesters:
Justice.

Woman with bullhorn:
When do we want it?

Protesters:
Now.

Woman with bullhorn:
What do we want?

Murv Seymour:
For the second time in just over a week, protesters marched to the state Capitol taking their battle to the heart of Madison

Woman with bullhorn:
This is about how Black people have been treated by this country and by this state.

Murv Seymour:
where they continue to interrupt daily routines with a loud and clear message. Back at the Corey Ruiz Memorial, this small section of community works to get back to normal. What’s normal and just how long it takes to get there is anybody’s guess. Reporting from Madison, I’m Murv Seymour for “Here & Now.”