Family of College Student Killed by Police Wants Answers

The family of a medical student from Texas shot and killed by sheriff's police near Oakwood early this month is accusing authorities of racial profiling.

Speaking in Urbana Wednesday, the parents and brothers of Oluwatofunmi Kaiyewu also say his death on the evening of April 6th was the result of a cover-up. The 23-year old man known as Toto was initially pulled over by a Villa Grove police officer, who said he was investigating a suspicious vehicle. The officer said he tried to strike him with the car... and a pursuit began on Interstate-74 that included sheriff's police from Champaign and Vermilion Counties, and the University of Illinois. After stopping the car, officers say they fired at Kaiyewu when he came at them with a machete and hunting knife. His mother Abbi says the vehicle was called 'suspicious' solely because a black man was behind the wheel. She calls her son a non-violent person only trying to study that night. "You don't take a machete to the library," says Mrs. Kaiyewu. "He was not expected to have this encounter. He was not expecting to die. He was just going to the library. He was not going to the war zone. So why would he take a machete and a hunting knife from his room to go to the library? It doesn't make sense."

Abbi Kaiyewu notes that police haven't been able to produce a video of what occurred after her son was stopped near Oakwood. Illinois State Police are still conducting an investigation, but in a press release issued by the agencies involved, Champaign County Sheriff Dan Walsh cites video evidence of Toto Kaiyewu physically assaulting the Villa Grove officer and holding the machete after the vehicle was stopped. And he dismisses any claim of racial profiling, saying there was no intial reason for an old Toyota to appear suspicious.

"I think the particluar facts, when they all come out, are actually going to be that the (Villa Grove) officer was behind the vehicle, and the gentlement stopped in the roadway and went back to the officer," says Walsh. "The gentlemen stopped before the officer turned on his lights or anything like that." Part of the joint statement released by the agencies involved in the shooting reads 'it is sad and horrible for Mr. Kaiyewu's family that things ended as they did, but Mr. Kaiyewu's actions controlled the outcome.'

The Kaiyewu's attorney, Jan Susler of Chicago, says Freedom of Information requests have been filed with all police departments for all evidence related to the incident, but adds a lawsuit could be filed at any time.