The death of a young Black man who was found hanging from a tree in North Carolina last week is being compared to the lynching of Emmett Till as local law enforcement facing accusations of secrecy insists that he died by suicide.

Javion Magee, a 21-year-old truck driver who called Chicago home, was found on Wednesday in the town of Henderson. Citing investigators, ABC11 News reported that Magee was found “not far from his truck, leaning with his back up against a tree and a rope around his neck. Magee was in Henderson making a delivery to the Walmart distribution center.”

What happened to Javion Magee?

Magee’s family, led by his cousin’s viral TikTok drawing attention to the hanging death, ruled out suicide as an option and said they suspected possible foul play.

But on Friday, Vance County Sheriff Curtis R. Brame rejected such claims and said all evidence points to Magee dying by suicide.

“I understand there’s over 1,000 hits on TikTok (accusing) the sheriff’s office of not being transparent, not providing information to the family and that is not true,” Brame told reporters. “There’s been information put out there that there’s a lynching in Vance County. There is not a lynching in Vance County. The young man was not dangling from a tree. He was not swinging from a tree. The rope was wrapped around his neck. It was not a noose. There was not a knot in the rope, so therefore, it was not a lynching here in Vance County.”

The preliminary autopsy was inconclusive about the cause of death.

A toxicology report is pending.

Skepticism of the police narrative

Lawyers representing Magee’s family suggested Friday that the Vance County Sheriff’s Office ruled the death a suicide too quickly.

Magee’s family is also disputing the police narrative that Magee bought the rope at the aforementioned Walmart before hanging himself, lawyers said.

“As of today, the authorities haven’t shown us anything proving that this young man with no history of mental illness took his own life,” civil rights attorney Harry Daniels said in a statement shared with NewsOne.

Magee’s cousin who posted the viral TikTok also claimed that the family was being prevented from having access to Magee’s body.

Daniels asked: “How can the police expect us to take their word for it when they won’t even let this family view the body?”

Civil rights attorney Lee Merritt, who has represented the families of Ralph Yarl – who was shot twice by 85-year-old Andrew Lester in April 2023 after the 17-year-old went to the wrong house to pick up his younger brothers in Missouri – and Ahmaud Arbery, compared Magee’s death to some of the most notorious instances of lynching in American history.

“We’ve heard stories like this time and again from Emmett Till in Mississippi to Edward Roach in Roxboro, North Carolina and we’re not going to let Javion McGee’s story get swept under the rug,” Merritt said in a statement. “This is 2024, not 1924.”

A spokesperson for Magee’s family doubted the police narrative,” Candice Matthews said. “The entire family is completely mortified and they are hurt, they are. They have a lot of questions and they just want to know what happened to their loved one.”

The imagery of a dead Black man with a rope around his neck, particularly in the South, will always be reminiscent of the untold number of racist lynchings in which Black men were killed for whatever violations their white judges, juries and executioners deemed them guilty of.

It was in that context that civil rights leader Bishop William Barber II also called for there to be “justice” for Magee.

“We must have truth transparency in this matter. Hanging is not a form of death that can be easily dismissed, particularly here in the South where it has been used as a weapon of terror against Black families for generations,” Barber said. “I join attorneys Daniels and Merritt as they seek truth and justice for Javion McGee and his family.”

Previously, Magee’s cousin who who goes by the handle @scottieprimpin on TikTok and shared the initial video that went viral called for more media attention to the case.

“The police officers are trying to say he went to a Walmart and purchased a rope and hung himself…we obviously don’t believe that and we are just asking for your help to push this story out there,” she said, adding that Magee’s story “isn’t covered on any local platforms.”

Magee’s cousin also claimed that Magee’s mother has not been allowed to identify her son’s body “due to COVID restrictions.”

Lynchings in recent years

In 2020, there was a series of incidents in which Black men were found hanging from trees and the local authorities appeared to be all too eager to immediately rule out foul play and determine that these men committed suicide. In 2021, we reported that in Mississippi — arguably the first state that is likely to come to mind in regard to America’s history of anti-Black lynchings — there had been eight suspected lynchings since 2000, all of which were ruled as suicides despite the objections of the victims families.

In late February, 29-year-old Trevonte Jamal Shubert-Helton was found hanging from a tree in Georgia, the state that holds one of the highest records in reported lynchings in America, second only to Mississippi. By March, his death was also ruled a suicide.

And, of course, we can’t forget Sandra Bland.

So, what happened to Javion Magee?

SEE ALSO:

‘These Are Not Suicides’: Series Of Suspected Lynchings Come As Nation Protests Racism

Justice For Amani Kildea: ‘Lynching’ Suspected After Black Man Who Outed Pedophiles Is Found Hanging

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