Photos: Family And Protesters Mourn Saheed Vassell, Blame Police

CROWN HEIGHTS, BROOKLYN — Hundreds of New Yorkers rallied Thursday night on the Crown Heights corner where Saheed Vassell was shot dead by police who mistakenly believed he had a gun.

“They murdered my son and I want justice for him,” Lorna Vassell told the enormous crowd that gathered on Utica Avenue and Montgomery Street, a day after police officers fatally shot her son.

“Saheed came from a good family and they had no right to shoot him down.”

About 400 people gathered to protest against the NYPD and the five officers who fired 10 rounds at Vassell, a man who reportedly suffered from bipolar disorder.

Vassell’s family, friends and advocates spoke out against the NYPD — who contend Vassell appeared armed and dangerous — and the unidentified people who called 911 when they saw him pointing an object that turned out to be a metal pipe at people on the street.

"His blood on your hands," one woman said. "A family is grieving, a mother's heart is bleeding, a son will never have his dad again. This is what your 911 call did."

Video surveillance shows Vassell waving a metal pipe in the moments before responding officers shot him down, but does not show the shooting itself.

Protesters accused the NYPD of protecting the officers whom they believe fired without identifying themselves or trying to communicate with Vassell in any way.

"Who'd they kill?" organizer Terrea Mitchell called into the crowd. "Say his name."

Marcus Vassell, the brother of #SaheedVassell, said he didn’t care about #BlackLivesMatters until NYPD officers shot his brother. “I’m tired of crying,” he said. pic.twitter.com/R2AqfFS3U1
— Kathleen Culliton (@K_Culliton) April 5, 2018

After repeated chants of “Black Lives Matter” and “No Justice, No Peace,” the family released a mass of red and white balloons into the air to memorialize Lorna’s son, Marcus’s brother and Tyshawn’s father.

The family of #SaheedVassell releases red and white balloons into the sky on the corner where police officers shot him. pic.twitter.com/jQDudzEiNR
— Kathleen Culliton (@K_Culliton) April 5, 2018

“Everyone that knew Saheed loved Saheed,” said his mother. “He did not deserve … for the cops to kill him.”

Photos by Kathleen Culliton