Utica Residents Grill Mayor After Police Killing of 13-Year-Old Boy

More than 100 residents of Utica, N.Y., grieving the death of a 13-year-old boy who was fatally shot by a police officer there last week, gathered at a church on Sunday afternoon to demand accountability for his killing.

The boy, Nyah Mway, was walking in the city with another boy on Friday night when they were stopped by three police officers. When one officer asked to pat them down, Nyah fled, footage from officers’ body-worn cameras shows.

The police said in a statement that Nyah had displayed “what appeared to be a handgun” as he ran. In footage that has been slowed down, it appears that he turns while holding something that looks like a handgun, before he is tackled, held to the ground and shot.

The police later determined that he had been holding a pellet gun.

On Sunday, the mayor of Utica, Michael P. Galime, answered questions from residents who filled the auditorium at Tabernacle Baptist Church. Police officials were not in attendance.

Almost all of the attendees were part of the city’s Karen community — members of an ethnic group from Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, who speak the Karen language. Nyah’s family members are Karen refugees.

In Utica, a city of about 60,000, refugees and their families make up about a quarter of the population.

Nyah’s killing was the first time that a Karen person in the United States was killed by the police, Mr. Galime said at the meeting, which was livestreamed on a Facebook page for Utica’s Karen community.

“As I stand here today, I am not asking you to stop being angry,” he said. “I am not standing here telling you to bury your grief and your feelings.”

Residents, some speaking through an interpreter, questioned the mayor about the protocols officers followed when pursuing people and asked what would happen next to the officers involved in the shooting. They asked Mr. Galime how he could prevent what happened to Nyah from happening to another child. Many voiced their anger at the circumstances of Nyah’s death: He was already on the ground, subdued by officers, when he was shot.

On Saturday evening, the police identified the three officers. Patrick Husnay, a six-year veteran of the Utica Police Department, was the officer who shot Nyah, the police said. The others were identified as Bryce Patterson, a four-year veteran, and Andrew Citriniti, who has been on the force for two and a half years.

Throughout the meeting Sunday, Mr. Galime emphasized that the New York Attorney General’s Office would determine if the officer’s use of force was justified. Though Mr. Galime often said he could not answer questions about the officers’ decisions because he was not personally there or because that was the purview of state officials, he told the crowd, “I did not see anger.”

“I saw three officers attempting to perform their jobs,” he said. “And the end result was the worst result we can possibly imagine.”

The meeting, which lasted about two and a half hours, was mostly peaceful. But at one point, organizers had to step in and calm several people down after a woman, who was upset about the mayor’s remarks at a news conference the day before, when he appeared to sympathize with the police officers in the presence of Nyah’s family members, began shouting at him.

Others joined her in sharing their frustrations.

Another woman challenged the mayor to “take a side,” saying the boys had been stopped because of their race. “This is an injustice,” she said to the mayor.

The mayor pushed back, arguing that he had reviewed the footage and that “there was no reference or any indication that there was any racism.”

According to a police statement, the three officers stopped the boys while investigating recent robberies where the suspects were described as Asian males who brandished a black firearm and “forcibly demanded and stole property from victims.” The boys were approached because they matched the description, the police said, and were near the location of the robberies at the same time of day.

The Police Department also released a series of videos from the officers’ body-worn cameras. In one clip, an officer approaches the two boys, one of whom is seated on a bicycle. Two other officers approach and begin circling the boys with their flashlights. The first officer then asks if they can pat down the boys to “make sure you have no weapons on you.”

At that point, Nyah fled on foot, according to the police.

Slowed-down footage shows Officer Patterson chasing him, and when Nyah appears to turn, holding something that looks like a handgun, the officer yells “Gun!” and tackles him.

Officer Husnay’s body-camera video shows him running behind the pair, pulling out his gun as he approaches them.

As Officer Patterson and Nyah struggle on the ground, a gunshot can be heard. The officers, including Officer Husnay, step away immediately, the footage shows.

Nyah was taken to a hospital, where he died, the police said.

In addition to the attorney general’s investigation, the Police Department is investigating the incident, Mark Williams, the police chief, said at the news conference on Saturday. The officers involved were all put on administrative leave with pay, he said.

On Saturday evening, Utica residents gathered near the site of the shooting for a vigil in the boy’s honor. Some lit candles, and some brought Mylar balloons in the shape of the number 13, Nyah’s age.

Earlier that day, Lay Htoo, who identified himself as a close relative of Nyah’s, said his family wanted justice for his killing.

The boy’s mother “wants the officer to be in jail forever,” he said.