Justice For Bodhi Phelps Red Balloon Vigil

May 24th, 2017 is the day of Bodhi’s 1-year anniversary of being shot & killed by the Gresham Police Department in Gresham, OR.

Here’s the backstory behind such an incident that affected the community. Last year on the same day the Gresham Police responded to several calls at about 3am regarding a disturbance in the neighborhood where banging and some screaming was reported to be heard. By then the 9-11 call was treated as a domestic dispute when Officers arrived on the scene where a man and woman were arguing outside their vehicle and hitting each other. The situation was also being treated as an “attempted kidnapping” situation at the time other outlets report because of other callers overreacting. Bodhi’s girlfriend, Courtney Sherrell told him to run when the Police came, because he had some outstanding warrants. Bodhi was terrified of going to jail and didn’t want to detox inside the jail. The Gresham Officers attempted to approach Bodhi Phelps who then ran from them and the Gresham Police pursued Bodhi around a cul-de-sac along SE 190th Ave & SE Grant St.

The officers chased Bodhi all throughout the cul-de-sac until he was at an dead end. Things escalated from there as two-officers from the Gresham Police Department got out of their vehicles and unholstered their handgun pointing it at Bodhi giving him orders to drop his weapons claiming he was brandishing two-knives in both hands and walking towards them.

After both Gresham Police Officers gave several orders to put down the weapons and get on the ground; it is being claimed in the police narrative that Bodhi ran towards one of the police cars and that gave both officers justification to fire their gun killing him. After the incident had happened where neighbors immediately heard all the commotion from the two officers shouting orders at Bodhi to put down the knives he supposedly was brandishing. Some of the neighbors were witnesses to what was happening and witnessed Bodhi Phelps shot at multiple times by the two Gresham Officers.

After Bodhi was struck multiple times in various places of his body his last words before he died were, “Did you really just shoot me!?” after that he was later pronounced dead by local law enforcement. The next day after Bodhi’s death there was several corporate media outlets reporting on the case and police involved in killing Bodhi Phelps. There were several conflicting reports that the mainstream media was reporting on at the time and including how the Gresham Police spokesman reported on the incident. Sadly, there was absolutely no video evidence that details what exactly took place and the Gresham Police Department isn’t equipped with body cams nor dashboard cameras in their police vehicles. Which is being speculated that made the Gresham PD easily sway the public and justify killing Bodhi Phelps. Sadly, Bodhi’s family can only base on what had happened with the witnesses who were present on the day Bodhi was running from police. Those witnesses Bodhi’s Mom got into contact with told her that her son was clearly murdered in cold blood and that he wasn’t attempting to assault the two officers who had cornered him at the dead end. Despite trying to fight the narrative in the case the grand jury found that Officer Gavin Sasser and Officer Kevin Carlson did no wrong. The mainstream media was mentioning Bodhi’s struggle with drug addiction pretty heavily and some of his criminal record after he was killed in order to justify the officers who shot and killed him.

After all the drama with this situation: affiliates, a handful of community members, Portland Activists, and of course folks from the PVGC (Powell Valley Green Collective) Organization all reached out to the Phelps Family after first finding out about Bodhi’s murder. Various groups have been working with the family helping them seek justice for their family member they strongly feel shouldn’t have been killed by the Gresham PD. Most of us felt we had to take action, because this was the first time in a very long time the Gresham PD had killed somebody. The family wanted to protest their relative’s death. There were about 2-3 protests that PVGC and other activists that came together to organize with the affected family who lost their most loved relative. We’ve made some great awareness about the death of Bodhi! After several of us had long talks with the family over Bodhi’s murder we felt that the police and media were totally demonizing him, because Bodhi’s entire family all had good stories, memories, and adventures to tell about Bodhi. He was especially loved and cherished by his whole family despite he had some problems. When we were all in contact with Bodhi’s family we were made aware that he had some problems such as drug addiction, but otherwise  he was a good kid and wouldn’t hurt anybody. We were told that he has had some dealings with police in the past but otherwise he would run away from the police never confronting them. The family is currently in contact with the ACLU and other organizations to seek guidance in legal help to pursue some kinds of changes.

Yesterday was Bodhi’s 1-year anniversary of his death on May 24th, 2017 and he was aged 22 years old last year when he was killed. The family decided to hold a vigil in memory of Bodhi Phelps and keeping his name alive in the community. The Phelps Family held their vigil at Main City Park in Gresham, OR under the covered picnic area. There was food and drinks as people gathered whom were family, friends, some people from the community, and a handful of activists. We all ate pizza together while socializing and talking about Bodhi including topics of police brutality and the death toll of police killing people in this country.

After everything was settled in there was some people who stood up to speak about Bodhi and went onto talk about the ever growing problems communities face with militarized police forces. A woman spoke about their personal experiences with the Gresham PD and contacted the Police Chief to complain about how their officers were being abusive and rude towards her. Things were pretty emotional. After everybody was done speaking some members of the Family related to Bodhi grabbed a bunch of red balloons and started releasing them into the sky.

One by one as each red balloon was floating away someone was reading off all the names of who were killed by Police in just the State of Oregon. The balloons were to symbolize remembering and celebrating the life of Bodhi Phelps. When all the balloons were released into the air we went to visit Bodhi’s grave after the vigil. After some time to mourn his death the event was at its conclusion. But we’re making the necessary connections to continue the fight against police brutality in our community. We are making sure that people are aware that calling the police can actually escalate situations leading to somebody getting killed by police. We still have a lot to do if we want accountability! This fight for justice isn’t over yet.

-PVGC