Thursday night’s police shooting in Dallas gripped a nation already well-entrenched in violence and racial tension.
Friday at noon in front of the Riley County Law Enforcement Center, members of the Manhattan community and RCPD officials gathered to find a sense of peace and good will after five Dallas PD officers were murdered.
The impromptu vigil was organized by a Manhattan woman who just wanted to assure the RCPD it was supported.
“I’m just a community member from Manhattan, and I’m here to support the police — our men and women in uniform, the highway patrol,” said Angela, who preferred not to be fully named. “It’s really just about them.”
With flags at half mast just above the RCPD’s own memorial of the county’s six fallen officers dating back to the mid-1800s, community members took turns speaking to the 30-40 people in attendance about the need for unity in the wake of the turmoil in Dallas.
“To me, there’s too much hatred in America,” said Manhattan First Free Methodist Church pastor and RCPD chaplain Lewis Smith, Sr. “It is time for us as a people, as a nation, to come back to our roots. And our roots is to put our faith and our trust in God, surrendering everything back in His hand — because the direction we’re heading is a bad direction.”
Smith, a black man, said the videos of Alton Sterling in Louisiana and Philando Castile in Minnesota — two black men shot to death by police officers just days before the terror in Dallas — were disturbing.
“It hurt my heart to see that,” he said. “It hurt my heart when you got a person laying on the ground — you just about have them handcuffed — and the next you know he’s been shot. An officer comes to a car and the next thing you know a man in the car is shot.
“That to me, should never happen. It should never happen. There’s other ways to deal with that and there’s too much of that happening in America.”
RCPD Director Brad Schoen, who spoke to the crowd during the vigil, said after that he appreciated the outside effort to do something.
“We got a call this morning from a member of the community who said, ‘Hey, I’m thinking of you guys,'” he said. “She had seen what the Dallas PD chief had said about a prayer meeting or a prayer vigil, and said, ‘We need to do that down there. Can we do that?’
“I said, ‘Well, thank you very much for calling and yes, that would be nice.'”
Schoen said it’s up to everyone to not succumb to the fear tragedies fuel.
“Don’t be controlled by the emotions of the moment,” he said. “Take time to consider what you’re reactions are and why, and make a conscious decision about what it is you think and why you think that.”
Schoen said its impossible to not feel the emotions of the moment, though.
“Grief, for everyone involved,” he said. “But primarily, as I said out here, we can’t let those who express their disaffection with violence control the agenda.”
Schoen said there’s no easy solution.
“Well, I think that’s a debate that will be had over the course of years, frankly,” he said. “It took a long time getting here and it will take a long time to get out, and it’s going to take cooperation on a lot of different levels among people right now who are just not seeing things the same way.”
A full video of the vigil, including comments by Schoen, Smith, Anglea and others, can be viewed on our Facebook page.
