Jason Pollock, director of Finding Kendrick Johnson and Stranger Fruit, has announced his next documentary film will focus on the story of Korryn Gaines.
Korryn, 23, was shot several times and killed by a Baltimore police officer in her Randallstown apartment following a six-hour standoff in 2016.
She live-streamed her standoff with police on Facebook and pleaded with the world to help save her life.
Officers were reportedly trying to serve Korryn with a failure to appear warrant related to a traffic violation.
When they arrived, they found Korryn in the apartment armed with a shotgun.
The standoff ended when a SWAT Team stormed the apartment and killed her in front of her five-year-old son, Kodi, who was injured in the gunfire.
The Gaines family has given Jason Pollock the exclusive rights to develop a documentary and a narrative film about Korryn’s life and her death.
Rhanda Dormeus, Korryn Gaines’ mother said:
Our family is so grateful to Jason and his team for choosing my daughter’s case as his next movie project.
I absolutely loved Jason’s investigative work on Stranger Fruit and Finding Kendrick Johnson.
We are so honored that he’s committed to spending his time fighting for us now for Korryn.
Jason added:
Justice for Black women in our society always gets swept under the rug. Far too often the media will focus on the police killings of men.
That’s why our team felt it is important to fight for Korryn right now.
We are going to change the discussion with this project and focus on a case that the media just used as a hashtag in 2016 and then quickly forgot.
In 2018, the Gaines family won a decision in civil court by a jury to receive $38 million for what happened to Korryn.
The verdict was overturned in February 2019, but reinstated by an appeals court in July 2020.
To this very day, the Gaines family has not received a dime and no criminal charges have been filed against anyone involved in Korryn’s death.
Stranger Fruit looks into the 2014 police shooting death of Michael Brown.
Finding Kendrick Johnson chronicles the mysterious death of Kendrick “KJ” Johnson in 2013.
Pre-production has begun on the Korryn Gaines documentary and it is expected to be completed by 2023.
I will keep you posted.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
