This Stops Today

September 3, 2018
In this heartfelt narrative, Carr, whose son Eric Garner was killed by a New York Police Department officer in 2014, traces her unplanned path to becoming a civil rights activist. Garner’s death, captured on a video that went viral, shows him saying, “I can’t breathe,” as the officer holds him down on the pavement. (According to many witnesses, Garner had been trying to break up a fight.) Carr recounts how Eric’s wrongful death galvanized her to action. She joined the Mothers of the Movement, a group of mothers whose children have died at the hands of law enforcement, attended the Congressional Black Caucus, marched with Rev. Al Sharpton, and campaigned for Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential election. This journey is placed within the larger context of her life: raised in a large, loving family in Brooklyn, Carr faced the death of her first husband, leaving her alone to raise their three small children, and the loss of another son, Emery, who died in a drug-related shooting in 1996. She recalls the lives of her children; the importance of her faith and community; and the challenges of her new activist role, highlighting the positive (Governor Cuomo appointing a special prosecutor for cases in which people have been killed by police) and the disappointing (a grand jury not indicting anyone involved in her son’s death). An advocate of better police training and community engagement, Carr acknowledges the problem remains daunting. This is a sincere and passionate account. Photos.