Film and TV mogul Tyler Perry has vowed to see to it that all of the kids of slain Atlanta man Rayshard Brooks, the youngest being one-year-old, will be able to go through college.
Perry, who opened the biggest independent film studio in the US in Atlanta last year, will also pay for Brooks’ funeral.
Brooks, 27, left behind four kids – his oldest only 13 years old. Brooks was gunned down on the day one of the kids, a girl, turned eight. In a memorial earlier this week, Chris Stewart, the attorney representing the Brooks’ family thanked Perry for the support.
“Support like that, people who are actually in the community that love the community that want healing, and families like this should never have to go through something like this. It’s a step forward, and we want to thank him,” said Stewart.
Protests erupted in Atlanta last week after Brooks was fatally shot by a white police officer in an altercation.
Video footage of the incident shows Brooks got into a physical fight with two police officers who had been called to arrest him. The call was made by an attendant at a Wendy’s restaurant who saw Brooks sleeping in his car on the Wendy’s premises.
Brooks broke free from the officers and grabbing one of the officers’ taser but was shot twice in the back, later succumbing to his injuries in a hospital.
Perry, on Wednesday, added his voice to calls for police reforms that takes into cognizance America’s racial tensions.
“I’m exhausted from all the hate and the division, the vitriol that I see online from one to another. I’m exhausted from seeing these kinds of senseless murders play out over and over again with no changes in our society,” the Madea creator said in a video message.
He also touched on the death of George Floyd, adding: “I felt for him and his family, I felt for all of us as Black people, I felt for my 5-year-old son. As I watched with tears in my eyes, it brought back a flood of years of emotions from carrying what feels like the weight of racism on my neck.”
