The mother of Darryl Tyree Williams, Ben Crump and many others gathered in Raleigh, North Carolina to call for accountability.
"That was my first born son," Sonya Williams said. "He was my only son, and he should not be dead. I want justice."
"How can we have peace in NC If we don't have justice for Daryl Tyree Williams?" asked Crump, the Williams' family attorney.
Crump called for the officers involved in Williams' death to be fired from the Raleigh Police Department and charged with manslaughter by the county district attorney.
Williams was sitting in his car when officers approached his vehicle and asked for him and another man to get out.
According to a police report by the Raleigh Police Department, officers found what they believed to be cocaine inside a dollar bill then proceeded to arrest Williams. Williams asked on multiple occasions why he was being arrested but never got an answer from Raleigh Police.
A struggle ensued between officers and Williams. Williams broke away briefly then fell to the ground. He was tased by officers three separate times before being handcuffed.
"The man said, 'I got heart problems.' He begged them to stop, and the people who were supposed to hear his cries the most let it fall on deaf ears when they tased him again," Crump said.
Raleigh police release video of stun gun used before man dies
Darryl Tyree Williams, 32, died at a hospital after being confronted and handcuffed by officers Jan. 17 in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Tasers are a fixture in modern policing. Some estimates say more than 75% of U.S. officers wear the device on patrol.
"Police departments attempted to fill a gap in the use of force continuum," said Dr. Kalfani Ture, ethnography fellow at Yale University.
Ture, also a former Atlanta police officer, says while tasers have become the stop gap between lesser forms of force — like pepper spray or batons — and firearms, the reliance on them should be reconsidered.
"There's a mounting level of evidence that demonstrates that tasers are just as deadly as firearms, and that should cause us some pause and require that we go back to the drawing board," Ture said.
According to Reuters, there has been at least 1,000 U.S. deaths as a result of taser use since 2001.
Along with calling for the arrest and prosecution of these officers, local activists called for the Raleigh Police to end their use of tasers.
"What we know based on the way Darryl died is that the Raleigh Police Department is unable or incapable of following their own safety policies," said Dawn Blagrove, executive director of Emancipate NC.
The Raleigh Police Department policy on tasers outlaws its use in response to "passive resistance," which includes physical resistance that doesn't pose an imminent threat.
The six officers involved in Williams' death have been placed on administrative leave while the State Bureau of Investigation probes the incident.
