WAUKEGAN — With tears in her eyes, 20-year-old Tafara Williams sat up in her hospital bed Tuesday and told how a Waukegan police officer kept shooting at her and her boyfriend, even though, she said, both had their hands raised and were unarmed.
“I kept screaming, ‘I don’t have a gun!’ But he kept shooting,” Williams said.
It was the first time Williams has publicly described the events of Oct. 20, when a Waukegan police officer wounded Williams and fatally shot her boyfriend, Marcellis Stinnette, and the father of her 7-month-old son, during what authorities have described as a traffic stop.
Three days after the incident, Waukegan Police Chief Wayne Walles announced he had fired the officer, saying the officer had committed “multiple policy and procedure violations.”
At a news conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, attorneys for Williams and her family accused the fired officer of profiling Williams and her boyfriend. But they also expressed hope — based on how the city has so far responded to the incident.
“We want to make this city, Waukegan, right now the example of accountability and transparency in policing. What Waukegan has done will give this family a sense of peace. It will not restore what has happened,” Chicago attorney Antonio Romanucci said.
Romanucci described the shooting incident as “needless, senseless and should never have happened.”
Clifftina Johnson cries while watching her daughter, Tafara Williams, speak to reporters from her hospital bed via a video conference call during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20. Three days after the incident, Waukegan Police Chief Wayne Walles announced that he had fired the officer, saying he’d committed “multiple policy and procedure violations.”
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Clifftina Johnson (back, left), Tafara Williams’ mother, cries as her daughter, Sasha Williams, sings during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Clifftina Johnson cries as she talks about her daughter, Tafara Williams, during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Family and supporters of Tafara Williams listen as attorney Antonio Romanucci speaks during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20. Three days after the incident, Waukegan Police Chief Wayne Walles announced that he had fired the officer, saying he’d committed “multiple policy and procedure violations.”
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Tafara Williams’ parents, Trevor Williams and Clifftina Johnson, talk about their daughter during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Tafara Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Clifftina Johnson cries as she talks about her daughter, Tafara Williams, during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Family and supporters of Tafara Williams listen as attorney Antonio Romanucci speaks during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20. Three days after the incident, Waukegan Police Chief Wayne Walles announced that he had fired the officer, saying he’d committed “multiple policy and procedure violations.”
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Flanked by family members and attorneys, Latoya Johnson talks about her niece, Tafara Williams, during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Family and supporters of Tafara Williams wear matching shirts and hold a prayer circle after a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Flanked by family members and attorneys, Tafar Williams talks about his sister, Tafara Williams, during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Tafara Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Clifftina Johnson (back, left), Tafara Williams’ mother, listens as attorney Antonio Romanucci speaks during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Family members and supporters cry while watching Tafara Williams speak to reporters from her hospital bed via a video conference call during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Clifftina Johnson cries while watching her daughter, Tafara Williams, speak to reporters from her hospital bed via a video conference call during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20. Three days after the incident, Waukegan Police Chief Wayne Walles announced that he had fired the officer, saying he’d committed “multiple policy and procedure violations.”
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Flanked by family members and attorneys, Clifftina Johnson, mother of Tafara Williams, cries during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Clifftina Johnson (back, left), Tafara Williams’ mother, cries as her daughter, Sasha Williams, sings during a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Family and supporters of Tafara Williams wear matching shirts and hold a prayer circle after a press conference outside Waukegan’s city hall complex, Tuesday morning, Oct. 27, 2020. Williams, 20, was wounded and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, was killed when they were both shot by a Waukegan police officer on Oct. 20.
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Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times
Williams, linked to the news conference via a Zoom feed, said the incident unfolded while she and Stinnette were sitting in her parked car.
“I had just put my babies to bed, and was sitting outside in the driver’s seat of my car to smoke outside the house,” she said.
A police officer pulled up, without turning on his lights or sirens, she said.
“I rolled down my windows and turned on all the lights inside the car so the officer could see I had no weapons and I wasn’t doing anything illegal,” she said.
Williams said the officer got out of his car and began harassing Stinnette.
“He said to Marcellis, ‘I know you from jail,’” Williams said.
Williams said she asked the officer if she and her boyfriend were under arrest. When he didn’t answer and stepped away from her car to use his cellphone, Williams drove slowly away, she said.
A short while later, she drove onto Martin Luther King Drive, still in Waukegan, and came upon another officer waiting for them.
“There was a crash and I lost control. The officer was shooting at us. The car ended up slamming into a building,” Williams said.
Williams said she and Stinnette both had their hands up.
“I kept asking him, ‘Why, why?’ he was shooting,” Williams said, adding, “More officers came and were pointing their guns at us. My blood was gushing out of my body.”
She said officers laid Stinnette on the ground and covered him with a blanket, even as he continued to breathe.
“They wanted us to bleed out on the ground,” she said.
Williams described Stinnette as the love of her life.
The briefing organized by her attorney, Benjamin Crump, comes exactly one week after the shooting. Police have said the vehicle driven by Williams, with Stinnette in the passenger’s seat, fled a traffic stop conducted by a white officer. They said that a short time later, another officer, who is Hispanic, approached the vehicle, he opened fire out of fear for his own safety when the vehicle moved in reverse toward him. No weapon was found in the vehicle.
Romanucci said neither he nor Williams’ family has been able to look at police videos from the incident. Waukegan Mayor Sam Cunningham has said the city would release police video from the incident. Romanucci and Crump said Tuesday they’d just come from a meeting with Cunningham.
“He did not say when,” Romanucci said. “All I can tell you is that it’s imminent. We’re just waiting for confirmation.”
Crump declined to detail Williams specific injuries, but said they’re “substantial.”
Addressing reporters Tuesday evening, Stinnette’s sister, Dhanellis Banks, said: “He’s dead at the hands of the people [who are] supposed to protect us. It’s not supposed to happen.”
Contributing: The Associated Press
