American hero Colin Kaepernick is doing his part to protect black and brown people who have unwanted encounters with the police in the future.
As reported on Sports Illustrated, Colin, alongside his Know Your Rights Camp, is offering free, secondary autopsies to family members of anyone whose death is “police-related.” The outlet points out, “the initiative collaborates with a panel of board-certified forensic pathologists who perform autopsies, disclose preliminary findings, and issue final reports to requesting families.”
In a statement, Colin said, “We know that the prison industrial complex, which includes police and policing, strives to protect and serve its interests at all costs.” He continued,
“The Autopsy Initiative is one important step toward ensuring that family members have access to accurate and forensically verifiable information about the cause of death of their loved one in their time of need.”
The initiative’s goal is to “eliminate concerns about reliability and objectivity of the first autopsy conducted,” the publication reports. The mission is to avoid any risks of “manipulation of evidence, and potential bias on behalf of the coroner or medical examiner and/or the use of faulty forensic procedures.”
Kaepernick’s last pro football game was in 2016, the same year he started kneeling during the national anthem to protest racial injustice. Since then, Kaepernick hasn’t been back on the NFL field, even though they claim they encouraged teams to look at Kaepernick.
Kaepernick and former teammate Eric Reid filed collusion grievances against the NFL, saying they were blacklisted because of protests during the anthem at games. They reached a settlement in 2019.
A few weeks ago, Spike Lee announced he’s teaming up with ESPN to direct a multipart documentary on Colin Kaepernick. It’ll feature exclusive interviews with the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback and access to his personal archive, ESPN reports. Fans will get to see never-before-seen footage from Kaepernick’s archive to provide “a full, first-person account of his journey.” No title or release date as of yet. We’ll keep you posted.
Great news for Black History month!