New Yorkers protest, march to a vigil for Eudes Pierre’s 4th Angelversary

Brooklyn, NY — Dozens of community members gathered at the NYPD’s 71st Precinct in Brooklyn on December 20. Four years before, Officers Peter Lan and Conrado Abreu-Gerez from the 71st Precinct shot and killed 26-year-old Haitian American Eudes Pierre while he was experiencing a mental health crisis.

Pierre’s family, alongside members of the New York Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (NYAARPR), organized a protest and vigil to mark four years since Pierre’s death at the hands of the NYPD.

Because Pierre died at 4:10 a.m. on December 20, 2021, organizers began the protest at 4:10 p.m. Sheina Banatte, Pierre’s cousin and the managing director of advocacy for the Justice for Eudes Pierre Coalition, described Pierre’s family’s ongoing grief and frustration, stating, “Erd should be here celebrating the holidays, and it’s a shame we have to be here. We need justice. We need accountability!”

Pierre himself called the police while experiencing the mental health crisis. Lan and Abreu-Gerez followed him in and out of the train station to his own home before shooting him ten times. Since then, the Civilian Complaint Review Board (CCRB) ruled that Pierre’s killers were acting “within NYPD guidelines.” Attorney General Letitia James declined to pursue charges against Lan and Abreu-Gerez, who continue to work for the NYPD. Peter Lan transferred to the NYPD’s notorious Intelligence Division while Abreu-Gerez continues to work at the 71st Precinct.

Ebtesham Ahmed of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) told the crowd, “This is only part of a frustrating pattern of the NYPD, who kill, brutalize, and imprison Black, Latino and other oppressed peoples all across the city, only to never face any kind of accountability.”

Also present were members of NYU Students for a Democratic Society and the best friend of eighteen-year-old Saniyah Cheatham, who died in NYPD custody on July 5, 2025. She described parallels between Cheatham’s and Pierre’s cases stating, “Saniyah was going through shit; I hear Erd was going through something too.” The NYPD criminalizes mental health crises, and disproportionately targets the Black, brown, and unhoused New Yorkers experiencing them.

Banatte and organizers from the New York Alliance ended the rally by delivering over 100 postcards written by members of Pierre’s family and the community to the 71st Precinct. They then marched to where Pierre was killed, now called Eudes Pierre Way. Protesters took the street along Eastern Parkway, demanding the city fire and prosecute Peter Lan and Conrado Abreu-Gerez.

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