Why Chief Mathis' Words Landed Differently in the Black Community

The recent comments by Columbus Police Chief Stoney Mathis have divided our community. Some have condemned his words as reckless and inflammatory. Others have defended them as the understandable emotions of a police chief whose officers had just been shot.

The divide has largely fallen along familiar racial lines. I cannot speak for White Americans, but I can speak to why so many Black Americans heard those words differently.

For many in the Black community, Chief Mathis' comments were not heard in a vacuum. They were filtered through generations of history—through decades of witnessing how policing has often produced vastly different outcomes depending on the race of the suspect.

That history matters. When many White residents heard the chief say that anyone who murders someone and shoots police officers is going to be killed, they may have heard determination, toughness, and support for law enforcement.

Many Black residents heard something else. They heard echoes of a justice system that has too often seemed to value some lives differently than others. History provides painful examples.

In 2015, Dylann Roof walked into Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and murdered nine Black worshippers during Bible study. After a massive manhunt, he was taken into custody without a single shot being fired. While waiting for federal authorities, officers even purchased him food after he told them he was hungry. That fact has remained a powerful symbol in conversations about race and policing.

He is far from the only example.

Patrick Crusius, accused of killing 23 people during the 2019 El Paso Walmart shooting, surrendered peacefully and was arrested alive.

Robert Crimo III, charged in the 2022 Highland Park Fourth of July parade shooting that killed seven people, was taken into custody without force.

James Holmes, who killed 12 people inside an Aurora, Colorado, movie theater in 2012, surrendered outside the theater and was arrested without incident.

Meanwhile, Black Americans can recite another list.

Walter Scott was shot in the back while running from a traffic stop over a defective brake light.

Tamir Rice was a 12-year-old child who was shot within seconds of police arriving because he was holding an airsoft toy gun.

John Crawford III was killed inside an Ohio Walmart while holding a BB gun that was sold in the very store where he was shopping.

Philando Castile calmly informed an officer that he had a legally licensed firearm before he was fatally shot during a traffic stop.

Rayshard Brooks was shot after falling asleep in his car in a Wendy's drive-through parking lot.

These cases differ in their facts and legal outcomes, and every police encounter must ultimately be judged on its own circumstances. But together they have shaped a deeply rooted perception within much of the Black community: that deadly force is not always applied equally.

That is why Chief Mathis' words resonated so differently.

This is not about defending violent criminals. Anyone who murders another person or shoots at police officers should be arrested, prosecuted, and held fully accountable under the law.

But accountability is not the same as execution. Our Constitution promises every person due process. Police officers are authorized to use deadly force when it is legally necessary to protect themselves or others from an imminent threat—not as punishment for the crimes someone is suspected of committing.

Words matter, especially when spoken by those entrusted with extraordinary authority. When a police chief publicly says, "We're going to kill you," many citizens hear more than frustration. They hear a statement that appears to replace the rule of law with the certainty of death.

Perhaps that was not Chief Mathis' intent. Perhaps he was speaking emotionally after one of the most traumatic days of his career.

But leadership requires more than good intentions. Leadership requires recognizing how words are received, particularly in communities whose relationship with law enforcement has been shaped by generations of mistrust. That is why this conversation cannot simply be dismissed as politics or "taking words out of context."

For many Black residents, those words touched a historical nerve that still has not healed. Until we acknowledge that history—and understand why people hear these statements differently—we will continue talking past one another instead of listening to one another.

The question before Columbus is not whether we support our police officers. We should. The question is whether we can support our officers while also insisting that the language of justice remains grounded in the Constitution rather than emotion.

Our community deserves both safety and accountability. Neither should ever come at the expense of the other.