Loved ones rally for justice for 8-year-old Fanta Bility in Sharon Hill on 1 year anniversary of her death
SHARON HILL, Pa. (CBS) -- It's been one year since three Sharon Hill police officers fired shots near a crowd outside a high school football stadium and killed 8-year-old Fanta Bility. Since then, there have been growing calls for reform and justice for Fanta.
"Say her name! Fanta Bility," the crowd chanted in Sharon Hill on Saturday.
Three hundred sixty five days ago, Fanta took her last breath in her mother's arms following a football game in Sharon Hill.
"It went by so fast, but the loss is so heavy," a man said.
On this grim anniversary, loved ones gathered at Memorial Park to say her name.
"We're not the same, she's not the same, none of us are," a woman said.
This rally comes weeks after Sharon Hill Borough Council released a heavily redacted report on the department's use of deadly force.
The report was meant to shed light on the circumstances that prompted Sharon Hill officers to shoot into a crowd of people, which killed Fanta.
"It was a murder," a man said. "And those associated with that need to do and serve a consequence of that."
The three officers involved claim they were responding to a shooting nearby. They have since been fired and charged. This grieving mother says she wants the focus shifted to Fanta.
"I'm so sad," her mother said. "Fanta was somebody. She was so kind. She was so good."
Reminiscing on Fanta's life, loved ones say she was fond of her siblings, the color pink and TikTok.
"Very friendly, very outgoing" a loved one said.
They marched from Memorial Park to the Sharon Hill High School football field to send a message that she was not forgotten.
"It hurts, it hurts," Joe Wilson said. "I didn't know her family or anybody, but I guess it could've been my baby."
The fight for justice and transparency is intensifying.
"It's just very devastating to be here one year later and still seeing the debate about whether or not officers should be charged or not," Dyamond Gibbs said.
The social justice nonprofit, U.D.T.J, is organizing a literature drop across Delaware County --- handing out flyers ---- to make more people aware of Fanta's story.
"We're just going to make sure we hit all the doors in Sharon Hill and Collingdale just to start out beginning next Sunday and the following Sunday," Gibbs said.
Delco Resists tells CBS3 this community needs answers.
"I don't feel like the public has more information than they did a year ago, no, no," Ashley Dolceamore said. "Not with the report almost being fully redacted."
Bruce L. Castor, the attorney representing Fanta's family, released a statement on Saturday night following the rally.
In the release, Castor said he and a family member of Fanta's sought to view the scene of the football field at the precise time of the 8-year-old's death with the lighting conditions as closely as possible to this time last year.
According to Castor, Fanta's family through the district attorney's office, asked for the lights be turned on at the stadium between 8:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. But, Castor said that the elected school board members would not allow the lights to be turned on.
Here's part of the release:
"The action by the members of the South Eastern School Board kept people from seeing the truth of the lighting conditions and evaluating for themselves the ability for officers to see at the moment they decided to use deadly force. Sharon Hill Borough's police fired at a moving car riddling it with bullets. In so doing, they shot innocent people and ended Fanta's life. That the members of the school board did not want people to see the area under similar conditions to the night of the shootings is eerily reminiscent of the decision by Sharon Hill council members to blackout critical portions of the commissioned report by former Philadelphia District Attorney Kelley Hodge."
