The man killed by a Grand Rapids police officer had just moved into his own place and was ready to settle down.
“That’s why the family are so broken. Because he represented hope for them.”Within minutes of being pulled over, Lyoya — who loved teaching traditional Congolese dances, and was quiet with strangers but a comedian to his friends — was dead.
In an interview at their apartment in Lansing, where photographs of Patrick hung on the walls, mourners crowded the living room and Congolese meals simmered on the stove, Peter Lyoya mentioned it again. A friend of Lyoya who is also a refugee from Congo, Jonathan Mukendi, said he’s now more fearful of police. After Lyoya was killed, he said, an officer pulled him over in nearby Allendale and asked to look at his cellphone for proof he was going where he said he was.
There were calls for change at Lyoya’s funeral, along with pleas that his death not be in vain. He was eulogized by the Rev. Al Sharpton, called an American of great distinction by Rep. Brenda Lawrence and mourned by a crowd of more than 1,500 whose members were often on their feet, some with fists raised.
In the front row, his mother rocked back and forth, tears streaming down her face, and his father sat with his head bowed. At times, relatives slid to the floor in their grief. On Facebook, he shared photographs of himself posing in stylish outfits — black jeans, studded shoes, colorful shirts. “Life is good no stress,” he wrote in the caption of one photo. “Happy with my life,” he wrote in another post. He liked soccer, music and dancing and attended a church where he occasionally helped interpret, said Mukendi’s brother Daniel, also a friend to Lyoya, who described him as “a good person” and “a cool guy.
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