Hundreds of protesters marched to the Broward County Jail chanting, “Black lives matter.”
In Miami, social workers and counselors gently guided a discussion about the trauma black people experience when a black person is killed by a police officer. They called it a healing circle.
After the recent police shootings of two black men in Minnesota and Louisiana, social justice groups and nonprofits quickly rallied to provide outlets in South Florida for communities to cope and protest.
NonprofitS.O.U.L. Sisters Leadership Collectiveorganized the healing circle in Liberty City.
Organizers say they wanted to create a safe space for black people to talk about how they feel after police-involved shootings and to talk about their own personal experiences.
Omi Milan who took part in the circle said she needed a place to process her feelings of anger, despair and hopelessness. As a black woman, she imagines in any of these shootings it could have been her or one of her family members.
“In my own house I really had a breakdown. I was like I cannot take CNN anymore. I cannot take the news,” she said. “I cannot listen to what’s on Facebook anymore because it's really affecting me. I’m taking it as a personal trauma.”
On the Facebook inviteation for the healing circle, some people took issue with how the event was set up. There were separate rooms for people of different races to process their pain.
Black people were in one room, white people were in another room and non-black people of color had their own space.
But Sandrine Louise-Jeune, who was there, said in times like this, people need to be able to open up freely with not just like-minded individuals, but people who have similar lived experiences.
Tanisha Douglas, co-founder of S.O.U.L. Sisters, responded to critics on social media, writing, “This is a moment to allow black people to organize the spaces that best suit our healing needs in the aftermath of the brutal attacks on black bodies.”
Meanwhile in Broward, Jodi-Ann Henningham, a leader with the Dream Defenders, led a throng of protesters through the streets and to the Broward County Jail.
People held up signs that read “Am I next?” and “Reform the system.”
Henningham said it’s vital to continue to bring attention to questionable police shootings of black men.
“We need to let folks know that what happened around the country this week can happen here and has happened here,” she said
Jermaine McBean is one example, she said.
A Broward sheriff's deputy killed McBean as he walked through his apartment complex with an unloaded air rifle in July 2013. According to a New York Times investigation, McBean, a 33-year old computer-networking engineer, was wearing earbuds when he was shot.
As the the protest outside the Broward County Jail came to an end, several prisoners banged the windowpanes of their cells.
Below them, protesters raised their fists.
