Surveillance footage from a Walgreens in San Francisco shows the moment a private security guard killed a young transgender man accused of shoplifting.
The footage captures the guard tackling and punching Banko Brown, 24, on 27 April before fatally shooting him as he exited the store.
The video, as well as the announcement by the San Francisco district attorney’s office it will not seek charges against the guard, is likely to reignite protests, which have popped up in San Francisco and spread through California since the killing, with activists demanding criminal prosecution and calling for increased investments in Black trans youth.
Brown was a budding community organizer known for helping Black transgender youth and had been struggling with homelessness in the weeks before his death.
The footage, released by the San Francisco district attorney’s office on Monday and published by the San Francisco Chronicle, is taken from a distance inside the store and doesn’t have sound.
It appears to show Brown walking to the exit of the downtown San Francisco Walgreens with a bag in his hand, and the guard, Michael Earl-Wayne Anthony, blocking him from leaving before pushing and shoving him. The guard then appears to punch at Brown’s head multiple times, before knocking him to the ground. The two appear to continue to tussle, with the guard at one point lifting Brown into the air before bringing him back to the ground and then lying on top of him as Brown’s legs flailed.
Brown then gets up and starts walking backwards out of the store, appearing to say something to the guard. Just as he steps outside on to Market Street, a busy thoroughfare in downtown, the guard fires a single shot into Brown’s chest.
Brown’s killing comes at a time of increasing violence against unhoused people in the US and an escalating crackdown on the rights of trans people. Brown was killed days before Jordan Neely, an unhoused street performer, was choked to death on a New York subway by a former marine, who is now facing manslaughter charges.
Brooke Jenkins – the district attorney elected on a tough-on-crime platform and a promise to harshly punish shoplifting and other property crimes – has faced intense scrutiny over her handling of Brown’s killing.
San Francisco police initially arrested Anthony, with the police chief saying: “You have to use force appropriately within the law.”
But the district attorney released him days later, saying in a statement that security video “clearly” showed the guard had acted “in self-defense”.
Jenkins had faced mounting pressure to release the video. Last week, San Francisco’s board of supervisors unanimously approved a resolution calling on her to make the footage public.
In her report on Monday, which was obtained by the Chronicle, the district attorney said there was “insufficient evidence to support the filing of criminal charges”. Prosecutors cited Anthony’s comments to investigators, alleging Brown was “aggressive” and intended to “fight” and saying “he was in fear that once he released Brown, Brown would ‘try to attack’ him, but this time with a weapon”. The officer claimed that Brown, who was unarmed, had threatened to “stab” him, but those remarks were not substantiated by witnesses, the Chronicle reported. He had no knife.
A witness, according to the district attorney’s report, said that the guard said “dammit” after he fired the shot, and that after Brown was hit, Brown responded, “Sorry man, that shouldn’t have happened.” The district attorney alleged that Brown “transformed a simple theft into a robbery when he used physical force to take property without paying”. The attorney also claimed that it appeared Brown was “lunging” at the guard at the moment he was killed, justifying “a reasonable, though in hindsight mistaken, belief that Brown posed an imminent threat of great bodily injury or death”.
The security guard in interviews repeatedly misgendered Brown, a trans man, referring to him as “she” and “her”.
Police, the district attorney said, recovered “products belonging to Walgreens”, and the guard told investigators Brown had taken “some beverages and a few snacks”. His loved ones said he was probably sleep-deprived and hungry that day while struggling to find stable housing.
“While I wish this tragedy would have never happened in the first place, it is my duty to follow the law and the evidence wherever it leads,” Jenkins said in a statement. “I join [Banko’s] friends, family, and community in grieving him and searching for ways to address the systemic issues that led us to where we are today.” Anthony could not be reached.
Friends and family of Brown argued last week that Jenkins’ decision not to pursue charges “sets a dangerous precedent”. In a statement released through the Young Women’s Freedom Center, a local non-profit group where Brown was a volunteer organizer, they argued: “In a city like San Francisco, where so many have to make tough decisions to meet their basic needs, arming stores with the pass to use armed force will result in much more tragedy.”
Julia Arroyo, co-executive director of the group, which has demanded an end to armed guards at retail stores and increased investments in housing and resources for trans and queer youth, said in a statement on Monday: “We do not need to see the video to know that Banko Brown’s killing was unjustified. Armed force is not a justified response to poverty. Young people, especially Black and trans youth who experience poverty, deserve love, care and the resources they need to survive and thrive. Banko deserved to live. He deserved to be protected and cherished. He deserved housing and to have his basic needs met.”
“It’s beyond comprehension why charges wouldn’t be filed,” said John Hamasaki, who ran for district attorney on a progressive platform last year and is a former member of the San Francisco police commission. “We see cases filed all the time when there’s a fight and somebody pulls out a gun and shoots. You don’t get to execute somebody once the threat is over, and that appears to be what’s happening.”
The footage, he said, seemed to show the guard quickly escalating the situation: “This is not what security guards are supposed to do. And it puts everyone in danger when they use excessive force at the beginning of an encounter.”
Although San Francisco is considered an international LGBTQ+ destination, queer and trans youth in the city continue to struggle with homelessness, poverty and a lack of basic resources. There are more than 400 LGBTQ+ unhoused youth in the city, but only around 45 housing spots designated for this community, advocates said. Brown’s loved ones said he was unable to get a housing spot he’d long been pursuing, had been turned away from multiple shelters and recently had no choice but to sleep in public spaces.
