Why the family of a black teen said to commit suicide wants the feds to investigate whether he was ‘lynched’
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Version 0 of 1. Lennon Lacy, a black teen in North Carolina, died at the end of August, his body found by local police hanging from a swing set in the middle of a trailer park. Local officials declared his death a suicide, a ruling that confounded his family. His mother didn't know what he was doing in that trailer park, home to mostly white families, or why police found him wearing shoes that did not fit him. On Friday, the FBI joined the investigation into Lacy's death after pleas from his family and the North Carolina NAACP. That news draws renewed attention to a troubling pattern, from Ferguson, Mo., to New York City: Families feel they can trust only the federal government to respond to and investigate such cases; they don't trust local officials. The NAACP is planning a rally Saturday to highlight the case. Claudia Lacy, Lennon's mother, publicly wondered in The Guardian on Friday if her son, who had been dating a woman she described as older and white, had been lynched in the year 2014. "Was he killed? Was my son lynched?" she wrote. In the column, she said police never visited her home or entered Lacy's bedroom to confirm why a teenager who did not seem depressed — a high school football player preparing for a game that night — would commit suicide. The family has also raised questions about how the scene of Lacy's death was investigated by the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation (SBI), and whether investigators took and shared photos with the medical examiner. State officials have welcomed the FBI. But the family's insistence on its involvement is striking. Here is a telling paragraph from the NBC News story in North Carolina: Bladen County District Attorney Jon David said Friday that the SBI's investigation was "nothing short of professional," but he called on the FBI to get involved with the case because Lacy's family said they had "critical" information that they are not willing to provide to state investigators. "Lawyers working on behalf of the family want to provide information only to the federal government," David said. Investigators haven't found evidence of any wrongdoing in Lacy's death, but "our minds are open," David said. Bladen County District Attorney Jon David said Friday that the SBI's investigation was "nothing short of professional," but he called on the FBI to get involved with the case because Lacy's family said they had "critical" information that they are not willing to provide to state investigators. "Lawyers working on behalf of the family want to provide information only to the federal government," David said. Investigators haven't found evidence of any wrongdoing in Lacy's death, but "our minds are open," David said. This is an important role that federal investigators play, bringing added resources and outside scrutiny to a local case. But it's also a sign of a law enforcement system not gaining the necessary trust of local residents when families believe their only recourse lies with federal intervention — when a family has information it feels it can only share with federal officials. People need to be able to trust the law enforcement closest to them, right in the communities where they live. This is a deeper issue that extends beyond the details of this case, or any findings the FBI may reach in North Carolina. Lacy's family has said it can accept the conclusion that he killed himself if a thorough investigation confirms as much. But the law enforcement system isn't working quite right for families when they think they can trust only the people who police the police, or only the verdict that comes from them. |