On the evening that he was shot, Nicholas was playing with friends on the rooftop of 423 Baltic Street, an apartment building in the Gowanus Houses complex, where he lived with his family. All photos by Meron Menghistab
Nicholas encountered Officer Brian George in the fourteenth floor stairwell. DA Hynes said that the area was dim, but witnesses said it was brightly lit.
Nicholas, center, age ten, was wrongly arrested when just 12 years old. A police officer told him "he would be dead by the time he is 15." Photo courtesy of Nicholas Heyward Sr.
Nicholas's bedroom has become Heyward Sr.'s makeshift office, as well as a sort of memorial for other victims of police brutality. In addition to childhood photos of Nicholas, protest posters that cry for justice cover the walls.
Angela Grant Heyward said she was "torn up" by her grief. "When I lost Nicholas, my heart was actually hurting," Grant Heyward said. "Hurting where I was holding my chest.
A protester, left, holds a sign honoring Nicholas N. Heyward Jr. at a 1997 march on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Photo courtesy of Nicholas Heyward Sr.
Heyward holds the toy rifle that he says Nicholas was playing with on the day he was killed.