I hate the media. I hate the NBA. And I strongly hate Lebron James.
LeBron James explained he deleted a tweet about the fatal police shooting of Ma’Khia Bryant, a 16-year-old Black girl, as he feared it would only serve to “create more hate” and “more racism.”
On Wednesday, the Los Angeles Lakers star posted a picture of officer Nicholas Reardon and captioned it “YOU’RE NEXT #ACCOUNTABILITY”, along with an hourglass emoji.
Earlier in the day, Reardon, who is white, was identified as the officer who shot Bryant dead the previous day in Columbus, Ohio. Officers from the Columbus Division of Police responded to a 911 call from someone who reported being physically threatened.
Body camera footage released on Wednesday, shows Reardon walking towards a group of people as Bryant wildly swings a knife towards another girl or woman, who falls back. Bryant then ignores repeated calls to get down and charges towards another woman, before being shot four times.
The shooting came just hours after former police officer Derek Chauvin was convicted of murdering George Floyd.
Floyd died on May 25 last year in Minneapolis after being apprehended on suspicion of passing a counterfeit $20 bill at a store. His arrest was filmed by a bystander, whose video showed Chauvin kneeling on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes, while two other officers pinned him down.
Charged with second-degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter, Chauvin was found guilty of all three accounts on Tuesday. James responded to the verdict with a single-word tweet on Tuesday, reading: “Accountability”.
