By: Robert Slater
On June 1, 2026, a jury in Columbia, South Carolina acquitted store owner Rick Chow of murder. Three years earlier, Chow chased 14 year old Cyrus Carmack-Belton more than a football field from his store and shot the child in the back as he ran. Chow believed Cyrus had stolen four bottles of water. He had not. Video showed the boy put the water back on the shelf, and the coroner confirmed the wound was consistent with a child running away. Chow claimed self defense and walked free.
Eight days later, a jury in Collin County, Texas convicted 19 year old Karmelo Anthony of murder and sentenced him to 35 years. Karmelo was 17 when he stabbed Austin Metcalf at a Frisco track meet after witnesses agreed Metcalf put his hands
on him first. Karmelo claimed self defense too. But before his trial began, every prospective Black juror was struck from the jury pool, and an all white jury rejected his fear in three hours.
Set those verdicts side by side and the message is plain. When a grown man chases a Black child and shoots him in the back, the system finds a way to call it self defense. When a Black child says he was defending himself
