On a cold January afternoon, about thirty people gathered in front of Cambridge City Hall to honor Arif Sayed Faisal, a UMass Boston student killed by Cambridge Police Officer Liam McMahon.
The vigil and speakout was organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) and local South Asian advocacy groups. “What happened to Faisal was a tragedy,” Aly Khan, an attendee, told the Register Forum. “It’s unconscionable that we can lose anyone in this way, particularly a young person like Faisal, and have no institutional response.”
On January 4th, 2023, Faisal was fatally shot by the Cambridge police while in the middle of a mental health crisis. According to the case report, Faisal was harming himself with a large knife when police accosted him. Faisal began moving towards McMahon while pointing the weapon at him, cornering McMahon against a backyard fence. Officers first fired a round of non-lethal projectiles to disarm Faisal and tried to talk him down.
“He’s gaining on me, like I said, faster than I could get away,” Officer McMahon told State Police investigators. “I obviously feared for my life, and in order to defend myself and keep myself from getting either seriously injured or, God forbid, killed, I had to defend myself and discharge my firearm.”
McMahon, an officer of seven years, shot Faisal a total of six times, resulting in Faisal’s death that day. According to the inquest, officers and paramedics immediately began administering first aid.
Following Faisal’s death, McMahon was placed on paid leave while the inquiry was conducted. Ultimately, it was decided that McMahon’s use of firearms was justified, and he has since returned to work.
“Faisal was going through a mental health crisis and he was not met with the care and compassion he needed,” said speaker Hannah M. Flores at the vigil. “He was met with bullets.”
An investigation after Faisal’s death showed that he’d been acting out of the ordinary leading up to the police confrontation. Faisal’s mother told investigators that “Faisal kept saying that the last day on Earth was coming,” according to a report of the interview.
Faisal’s death has raised some concerns about Cambridge police practices around people of color undergoing mental health crises. “We’re not safe when these police are killing indiscriminately without any repercussions,” Flores said. While Cambridge officers do have yearly firearms and use-of-force trainings, many at the speakout called for increased usage of HEART (Holistic Emergency Alternative Response Team), an organization that aims to provide care for individuals undergoing crises, instead of police response. Mathew Kennedy, a protest organizer, also announced the PSL’s demand for the creation of an Arif Sayed Faisal fund to provide “free mental health care for all children and young adults in Cambridge.”
In front of an array of carnations and a hand-drawn chalk mural, friends and community members remembered Faisal as a bright and passionate student. Preema Bangera, an attendee involved in many South Asian activist groups, said, “Arif Faisal was fighting for so many things [like] what needs to change for immigrant families.” Addressing Officer McMahon directly, Bangera told the Register Forum, “You took a human life. You took a human life of somebody who was trying to make a difference.”
This article also appears in our January 2024 print edition.
