A tearful candlelight vigil was held in Northridge for a man shot to death on New Year’s Eve by an off-duty immigration officer.
Sunday evening, a crowd of about 50 gathered on wet asphalt outside the Village Pointe apartment complex in Northridge to grieve Keith Porter Jr. The group included activists, family members and Porter’s co-workers from Home Depot. The Compton man was shot at the complex on Dec. 31 by an off-duty Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent, according to authorities.
Black Lives Matter-Los Angeles — of which Porter was a member — said in a news release that the vigil was organized to memorialize the 33-year-old father and call for an independent investigation into his death.
“We want to recognize that one of the worst imaginable injustices has been committed, and there will be time for us to protest,” Melina Abdullah, a co-director of Black Lives Matter Grassroots, said during the vigil. ”This is a time for grief. … We are not going to be quiet.”
In a statement after the incident, Homeland Security officials said the agent was “forced to defensively use his weapon” and opened fire “to protect his life and that of others.” Officials said Porter was an “active shooter” threat.
According to a statement from the civil rights organization Project Islamic Hope, Porter was celebrating the new year by firing a rifle into the air when an “overzealous” off-duty agent shot him.
Firing guns into the air, which poses the risk of people being injured or killed, is a felony. The fatal shooting of Porter is under investigation by the Los Angeles Police Department’s Robbery-Homicide Division, officials said. The FBI, the U.S. Department of Justice and Homeland Security Investigations also are handling the case because a federal agent was involved.
On Sunday evening, mourners crouched around a makeshift memorial and wrote heartfelt messages to Porter and his family on a small board above his photo. Porter is survived by a 9-year-old daughter.
Bishop Jack Wilson, a friend of Porter’s mother, was on hand for the gathering. The Solid Rock Mission Church official said he remembered Porter as a child, when he was always smiling and had the manners of an old Southern gentleman.
“He was full of life, and always smiling,” Wilson said. “It hurts me that he didn’t take his last breath, but his last breath was taken from him.”
Abdullah said Black Lives Matter Grassroots, an activist group within the BLM movement, would meet with L.A. County Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman on Tuesday morning to demand that there be a federal investigation into the agent responsible for the killing. Authorities had yet to identify the agent Sunday.
Hochman “was elected from the backing of police associations that came from murderous cops, like the one who stole Keith’s life,” Abdullah said. “The people have the power, and the people have a demand.”
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