The day we visited George Floyd Square, the public memorial located where he was killed, we encountered a lady unexpectedly.
“I’m George Floyd’s aunt,” the lady told us after a brief conversation.
Her name is Angela Harrelson, and she is 64 now. After the memorial was set up, she started coming four to seven times a week.
A few days later, I had another opportunity to interview her.
“It was very painful”
Looking back six years ago to when former police office Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd, Harrelson didn’t know what was happening.
She had just finished a nursing shift and returned home tired.
The next day, she got a phone call from a reporter. “I didn’t know what to say,” she recalled, adding her first thought was he must have the wrong family.
Then she received another phone call.
“Angela, turn on the TV,” her sister called to tell her. “The police killed Perry.”
The family called George by his middle name, Perry.
Angela Harrelson was shocked to find out Perry was dead. She couldn’t believe it. “I was just crying,” she said. “It was very painful.”
The death of Floyd sparked a series of demonstrations in Minneapolis and other U.S. cities. Meanwhile, the Black Lives Matter movement spread rapidly across the world.
“I felt like I had to do something,” she said. But she didn’t know what to do.
She prayed.
“The message was given to me by God,” she said. “He said, ‘If I can give him the strength to say ‘I can’t breathe’ over and over again, surely I can give you the strength to be a voice for him.’”
As a nurse, Harrelson knew how difficult it was to repeat those words in pain and fear, much less more than 20 times, as a police officer held a knee to your throat.
She found her voice and started to speak out as a family member. Over these past six years, she has given many media interviews and public speeches.
Harrelson also published a book, “Lift Your Voice: How My Nephew George Floyd’s Murder Changed the World,” in 2022.
For Harrelson and her family, all of this is part of the healing process.
Change the World
In 2021, Chauvin was found guilty and sentenced to 22.5 years in prison on charges of second-degree murder, third-degree murder and manslaughter.
When asked what changes she has noticed after six years, “I saw the reforms. Reform was no longer a casual word in the dictionary.” Harrelson pointed to police reform within the system in general and felt local officers have become much more conscious of their behavior.
Following widespread social movements across the United States, legislators pushed for systemic changes to the criminal justice system. Some states banned police chokeholds and began requiring officers to intervene against excessive force, according to the Stanford Center for Racial Justice.
However, significant debate remains. Some cities are loosening restrictions on police pursuits, others have recently deployed a wider array of force.
The murder has also raised major awareness across society. When people saw Floyd be murdered, “They knew that police or race was involved,” Harrelson said. “You know, this is how they treat Black men.”
Harrelson grew up in the era following the Civil Rights Movement, a movement fought for racial justice and equal rights for Black Americans. It led to historic legislation that banned discrimination and segregation based on race, religion, national origin and sex, while also removing racial barriers to voting.
“It did move people,” Harrelson recalled. “But they were still powerless.” Growing up in somewhere else, she still faced continuous struggles with racial discrimination.
Yet Floyd’s death “opened the door,” she said, forcing people to confront systemic racism and policing.
Five years later, a Pew Research Center report found that 72% of respondents said the increased focus on race and racial inequality following Floyd’s death has not led to changes that improved the lives of Black people.
Still, Harrelson remains optimistic, and says she refuses to allow ignorance to extinguish the love for humanity.
“Keep hope contagious,” she said. “That’s my message. That’s what we have to do.”
