One year-old Kohen Wiley was shot and killed by police outside a Walmart parking lot on June 14, 2026 (Photo courtesy of Facebook)
David L. Snelling
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who was hired by the family of a one-year-old boy shot and killed by police in Senatobia, Mississippi, said an autopsy contradicts the officers’ report of the incident.
According to Atlanta Black Star, police officers who responded to an alleged shoplifting call at a Walmart parking lot on June 14, 2026, fired shots into a car they say was headed straight for them.
One year-old Kohen Wiley, who was Black, was shot and later died at the hospital, sparking public outcry and calling for charges against the police officers.
On Wednesday, Crump and Van Turner, a Tennessee lawyer and former president of the NAACP Memphis chapter, shared preliminary findings from an independent autopsy during a news conference which deepens the protest.
Crump said Wiley was shot by an officer in the parking lot in Senatobia, about 40 miles south of Memphis.
He said the independent autopsy showed the bullet that struck the child came through the car’s side, and not the front, as the officers claimed.
Crump said the pathologist noted injury patterns on the child’s body caused by debris in the bullet’s wake.
He showed a picture of the child’s right torso with several abrasions.
The attorney said those abrasions were consistent with pseudo-stippling caused by tempered glass, likely from the right-side passenger window.
Crump also displayed a picture of the car, showing the damage to the passenger window.
Police said another person in the car was critically injured in the shooting.
“This police officer is shooting from the side,” Crump said during the press conference. “You can’t get that shot from the front. Why would you shoot into a vehicle from the side where you’re clearly not in harm’s way?”
News reports said one officer fired a shot into the car which was fleeing the scene as the car was headed straight in the officers’ direction.
Police officers at Walmart saw two subjects and a juvenile child running from the store and entered the vehicle.
Kohen’s mother, Vellesiya Wiley, was a passenger in the car and her friend was driving.
“I raised my baby up trying to show [the officers] he was in the car,” she told reporters.
Police said another person in the car was injured in the shooting and listed in critical condition.
The Senatobia Police Department and the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation (MBI) have publicly described the shooting as an officer‑involved incident that occurred while officers were responding to the reported shoplifting call.
The MBI stated that the driver of the vehicle drove toward the officers, almost striking one, prompting an officer to fire a shot at the car.
No police officer was injured during the incident and the police department said it is committed to full transparency and will share information and body cam footage once they become available.
The MBI has not publicly identified the officers and no charges have been filed, as the investigation continues.
Crump and Wiley are disputing the police account of the incident.
Wiley testified the police were dispatched to the scene over allegedly stolen diapers and said the driver was not attempting to hit the officers.
Wiley hasn’t been charged with any crime.
She has yet to file a lawsuit.
Based on reporting by South Florida Times.
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