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At an emotional private meeting in Lansing, Gretchen Whitmer offered condolences Monday to the parents of Patrick Lyoya, a Congolese immigrant killed by a Grand Rapids police officer two weeks ago.


Patrick Lyoya (Family photo, via African Collaborative Network)

WOOD-TV of Grand Rapids shares this account of the Swahili-speaking couple's reaction, relayed through a translator:

"She showed us concern that she was really touched in a negative way about what happened and that she is mourning with us the same way we are mourning," Peter Lyoya said.

The Lyoyas said they bonded with the governor over the love a parent has for their child. "We saw tears coming from her eyes. She cried the way that we’re crying," Dorcas Lyoya said.

Their 26-year-old son was shot while struggling with an officer who stopped his car April 4 over a license plate issue. The police last Wednesday released videos from four cameras, which sparked daily protests in Grand Rapids as community members and civil rights leaders call for the officer to be identified and charged. The seven-year police force member is on paid leave.

The family's attorneys, Ven Johnson of Detroit and Benm Crump of Florida, on Friday morning will present results of an autopsy they commissioned from Werner Spitz, a retired Macomb County coroner.

Stephen Cohle, Kent County's chief medical examiner, did an official autopsy the day Lyoya died. He awaits toxicology results and will release findings when a state police inquiry is done, media reports say. 

A march is planned Thursday afternoon in Lansing, starting at 3 p.m. from St. Luke Lutheran Church on South Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol for a 4-6 p.m. rally organized by the state’s Black Lives Matter organization. 

The next morning, Lyoya's public funeral will be conducted at Renaissance Church of God in Christ on Grand Rapids' southeast side, about three miles from where he died April 4.

He and his family came to the United States in 2014 as refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. West Michigan reportedly is home to about 700 emigres from that country in Central Africa.

Earlier coverage:

Read more: WOOD-TV