Two years after Jamal Francique was shot and killed by Peel police, his family continues to mourn as they seek justice for his death.
Relatives and friends of the 28-year-old gathered Friday night in Mississauga at the spot where he was fatally shot on the night of Jan. 7, 2020, for a vigil to honour and remember him.
Francique's father, Derek, said the family is still grieving the death of his son "like it was the first day."
"We can't eat. We can't sleep. We can't think. These people that took my son, they got to go home and eat their Thanksgiving dinners. They got to have their Christmas. They get to have their New Year's parties. While I sit here with my family, broken like it's the first day," Derek said.
"Nobody's done anything to make any situations correct and right. All they've done is made a disarray of our families. We want someone to stand up and take accountability."
Derek added that his family used to laugh and joke around, but they couldn't do that anymore after Francique died.
He called on Peel police Chief Nishan Duraiappah to do the right thing and punish the officer who took his son away.
"You have destroyed families. You have destroyed brothers and sisters. You have destroyed grandmothers and grandfathers," Derek said. "You don't know the magnitude of what you guys have done."
The Special Investigations Unit (SIU) probed Francique's death and found no reasonable grounds to criminally charge the officer who fired the shot.
READ: SIU clears Peel police officer who shot and killed Jamal Francique in Mississauga in 2020
The family has been calling for the investigation into Francique's death to be reopened. Knia Singh, the family's lawyer, claimed that the SIU report was littered with inconsistencies, discrepancies, and inaccuracies.
But despite that, he said the police watchdog and the Attorney General had refused to reinvestigate.
"We have accountability systems in our province and in our country. And the fact that people are being killed after interactions with police and there is no accountability is a huge problem," Singh said at the vigil.
"Why do we have accountability systems in our province if they are not going to work?"
A close friend of Francique also spoke at the vigil, saying that his death and how he was killed continue to haunt her. She said her friend was a kindhearted and trusting man who wanted to make a positive impact.
"The system is not broken. It is doing exactly what is what it is intended to do. It must change and we must not give up. We stand here with others who have lost loved ones, brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, lovers, friends and fathers and mothers to this system. It cannot continue," she said.
"Let us not allow him to be viewed as deserving of being murdered. He was a human and one who was well-loved."
