DC Protester Continues Recovery After Being Shot By Pepper Bullet

WASHINGTON, DC — Matthew Leo Cima, a bartender and server who lives in Adams Morgan, was injured during a May 31 protest outside the White House. His eyesight was damaged and he continues medical care to see what recovery he can make.

That weekend, Cima had joined hundreds of other demonstrators marching in support of Black Lives Matter and against police violence. The night ended for Cima when he was struck in the eye by a pepper bullet.

Despite his injury, Cima rejoined protesters two nights later to show solidarity and support for their cause.

"In the end, if I don't regain full vision back in my eye, a little bit of vision loss in my eye is nothing in comparison to what African Americans face every day in this country, which is real bullets fired off by racist police officers," he said, at the time. "And of course not every officer is racist. ... But there's too many of them. I wanted to go out there and support. I anticipate going out there again."

On June 5, Cima underwent surgery at the Wilmer Eye Institute at Johns Hopkins University to stop sub-macular hemorrhaging in his left eye.

"Two weeks later, I had basically the same surgery again to try and continue to repair the tear in my retina, which was the injury I sustained," Cima said, recently. "After those two surgeries, they determined that wasn't going to fix it. So then I had an additional two surgeries after that and that was part of a nationwide clinical trial to fix what's called traumatic macular holes, which is what I have."

During the last two surgeries, doctors harvested retina cells from another part of Cima's eyeball to provide scaffolding for the problem area. Although the surgeries appear to have been successful, Cima still experiences light blindness in his left eye and has lost depth perception.

"I have exhausted all potential medical remedies, surgical intervention," he said. "Now it's a waiting game. It seems likely that I'm going to have large areas of light blindness in my left eye. ... I can probably get glaucoma when I'm older, because it would be like what boxers get because of the trauma, but that's way down the line."

Cima, like many other members of the restaurant workforce in the District, lost his job last year due to the the partial government shutdown caused by the pandemic.

"I haven't been able to find any work since then, but that's more COVID-related than injury-related," he said.

When Cima's not looking for a job, he continues to pay attention to the ongoing protests around Black Lives Matter and calls for racial justice. On Nov. 14, he even participated as a counter-protestor to the Million Maga March in D.C.

"I don't know when it became like Black Lives Matter is construed into somehow in some people's minds that Black Lives Only Matter, when that that's definitely not what's going on or what people are trying to defend," he said. "It's really sad that if you're on one side of the fence you're probably against social justice, but why? Why not just let every human being have an equal chance?"

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