On Last Night's Shooting, and What We Owe Each Other
- Apr 30
- 6 min read
Our prayers are with the Columbus police officer who was shot on April 29th, his family, and every person connected to that night's events. This is a human moment. It deserves to be treated as one.
I will not use this moment to make a sweeping point about policing in America or about any local and unrelated case where an officer is currently on trial for murder. Neither should anyone else.
What happened is one situation, with one set of facts, that has not yet been fully established. Thousands of police and community interactions happen in Columbus every single day. Most of them are uneventful. Some of them are tense. A small number require split-second decisions. That is the reality. Nobody serious is debating whether policing is dangerous. It is. Nobody credible is suggesting that officers should not defend themselves when their lives are in genuine danger and they have a rational and reasonable fear for their life. They should.
What I am not willing to accept is the use of this officer's pain to pre-justify the future use of deadly force in situations that have not yet occurred.
It tells officers, before the facts are even in, that the public second-guesses them unfairly. It implies that criticism of deadly force is inconsistent or opportunistic. It frames accountability as an obstacle to safety. That framing is both inaccurate and dangerous. It does not protect officers. It isolates them. It does not build community trust. It dismantles it.
I know something about this.
In my legal practice at Walton + Brown, I have represented dozens of law enforcement officers across the state of Ohio, not in use-of-force cases, but in discrimination cases. I have consulted privately with dozens more, conservatively. I have been a trusted partner to those in law enforcement who can't trust their internal process and who resent their public portrayal by those who represent them most visibly. The few end up overshadowing the many. However, the silent majority of police officers want what the people want - to finally close the distance between the badge and the community it serves.
My friends, clients and public safety colleagues and I have had and continue to have candid conversations about not only community-police relations, but police-police relations. The kind of tough, honest conversations that get offered in public symbolically but that I have already been having with genuine candor for over a decade.
I know the war stories in intimate detail. I stand on the shoulders of those whose pain and triumphs guide my mission-driven work. Officers who were treated unjustly by their own departments. Officers who needed someone to advocate for their labor, employment and civil rights. Officers who had not been properly protected or represented by their labor union. I was and am and will continue to be in their corner - and they've got my 6.
I have recovered for officers not only precedent-setting settlements, but included when possible non-monetary relief in the form of department-wide policy changes that protect officers internally. In one case against the Columbus Division of Police, that meant amending Rule 1.48, reclassifying discrimination, retaliation, and hostile work environment as critical misconduct subject to suspension or termination. That is not a settlement check.
That is a policy that protects every single officer who comes after. It has done so for the past six years. It will continue to do so.
That is not the profile of someone who is anti-police. That is the profile of someone who takes civil rights seriously, without exception. Including when that means standing with the people labor is supposed to protect.
When officers stand with the people, the people have their 6.
For several years, I have served on the Ethics and Equity Advisory Council for Axon Enterprise, one of the largest and most influential public safety technology companies in the world. The council has fifteen members globally. Ten of us are based in the United States. Axon is a multi-billion dollar, publicly traded company that is transforming how law enforcement agencies train, equip, and operate. They make body cameras, digital evidence platforms, and the TASER devices that officers carry every day. Their mission is to make encounters safer, not just for the public, but for officers. I consult on product features and best practices designed to reduce harm on all sides of a police encounter. That work shapes how law enforcement encounters play out, and are made safer, across more than 17,000 state and local public safety agencies in this country. I do that work because I believe policing can be made safer. Not just for communities. For officers too.
Over the past year, alongside law enforcement leaders and police reform advocates from across this country, I have lobbied several times on Capitol Hill in support of the Law-Enforcement Innovate to De-Escalate Act, H.R. 2189, which the House of Representatives passed on February 11, 2026. The bill removes regulatory barriers to next-generation conducted electrical weapons, the kind that give officers a more effective, less lethal option in dangerous situations. More powerful TASER technology means officers feel more protected. It means that in a moment of danger, there may be a path that does not end with someone dead. That is not soft on crime. That is smart on safety. I sat in rooms on Capitol Hill alongside some of the toughest sheriffs in this country, on the same side of the table, working toward the same outcome.
The National FOP has publicly advocated for the same:
"As law enforcement agencies continue to invest in advanced training and technology to reduce fatal encounters, access to conducted energy devices and similar less-than-lethal alternatives must be expanded. The updates in this legislation will ensure greater availability of these tools, enabling officers to respond more effectively while prioritizing the lives and safety of all individuals involved. On behalf of the more than 377,000 members of the Fraternal Order of Police, I thank you both for your leadership on this issue." — National Fraternal Order of Police
I don't need the thank you. I need partnership that acknowledges past and present pain, and does not stand in the way of present and future progress. That is what showing up looks like. That is what collective power produces.
What is being built in Columbus does not require anyone's permission. Partnership is the offer. Progress is the guarantee.
The FOP statement on this shooting suggests that accountability narratives are inconsistent. I suggest the opposite. Consistent accountability is what builds the trust that makes officers safer in communities over time. Fear and division protect no one. Collective power, the kind that put advocates and law enforcement leaders in the same Capitol Hill conference rooms and moved legislation forward, is what saves lives on all sides.
We do not yet know all the facts about what happened on April 29th. What we do know is that we have a body of data, decades of lived experience, and a growing body of innovation that point toward a better model. One built on shared empathy. One built on genuine de-escalation, from both sides. One that invests in tools and training that protect everyone.
Officers in this country already carry a license to kill. It is codified in law. It is upheld by courts. Nobody is taking it away.
What we owe each other, as a city, as a community, and as leaders committed to a more powerful tomorrow, is a shared commitment to something more: a license to heal.
That is the conversation I am committed to leading as President-Elect of NAACP Columbus Branch 3177. It is a conversation I will have with law enforcement leaders, community members, elected officials, and anyone else who is serious about a Columbus where everyone makes it home.
I look forward to that work.
As we engage in that work do understand this: collective power does not ask to be recognized. It simply becomes undeniable. I look forward to undeniable progress that returns all power to the people.
Sean L. Walton, Jr. is President-Elect of NAACP Columbus Branch 3177, and a civil rights and personal injury attorney with Walton + Brown LLP.
