Officer who shot and killed Black toddler in Mississippi resigns from police force

Hunter Foster, the Mississippi police officer who shot into a vehicle and killed one-year-old Kohen Wiley, has resigned from the Senatobia police department. Earlier this week, Mississippi’s attorney general, Lynn Fitch, announced that the shooting was “justified”.

The Senatobia board of aldermen accepted Foster’s resignation on 21 October and the resignation took effect immediately. Foster was placed on leave on 16 June, days after the 14 June shooting. Yesterday, the Mississippi department of public safety released body-camera and surveillance footage from the shooting, at a Walmart in Senatobia, during which the toddler died in his mother’s arms after being shot.

In the footage, Foster is seen running out of a Walmart with other officers after an employee said shoplifters were fleeing. Officials have alleged that Kohen’s mother and a friend stole diapers from the Walmart; neither woman has been charged.

Within seconds of leaving the store, Foster aimed his gun at a vehicle in which Kohen, his mother and another woman were. Three shots were fired, all from Foster’s gun, though several officers drew their guns. Foster hit and injured the driver of the vehicle, and killed Kohen.

At a press conference on Thursday, the prominent civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing Kohen’s family, called for a federal investigation into the shooting. He is also calling for Foster to be decertified, which would prevent him from serving as a police officer anywhere else.

“The bullet that killed Kohen Wiley was not justified,” Crump said. “This decision sends a message that a Black baby boy, his life, is not as valuable as the white diapers that he is wrapped in.”

Kohen would have turned two on 1 November.