25-year-old killed by KCK police had wanted to be cop. Then he was beaten, mother says

Wednesday was supposed to be a breath of fresh air for Amaree’ya Rashon Henderson and Shakira Hill.

The couple, together for three years, took a break from working to go out to eat, take a walk around a park and dream about their future together.

Henderson, 25, asked what Hill wanted to do for her quickly-approaching 24th birthday. They talked about what else they needed to do to get their lives together before turning 30. With their lease almost up, they considered taking out a loan to buy a bit of land to build a house before starting a family.

Up to that point, the day was perfect, Hill said.

But as the sun set, and Henderson and Hill dropped off a final DoorDash order, then headed to pick up Henderson’s 2-year-old nephew for some quality time, the couple was pulled over by Kansas City, Kansas, police.

Within minutes, Henderson had been shot dead by an officer with Hill in the passenger seat beside him.

Now, his family is left asking why.

“I want it to be known they killed an innocent man,” Henderson’s mother, Pauletta Johnson, told The Star at her home on Thursday morning. Johnson and Hill said Henderson was not armed, nor did he have a gun in the vehicle.

Officer Donna Drake, a police department spokeswoman, said Wednesday night that the shooting happened about 8:30 p.m. after an officer pulled over a vehicle in the 1100 block of Metropolitan Avenue for a traffic violation.

Drake said a “confrontation ensued” during the traffic stop that ended with the police officer fatally shooting Henderson. The Kansas City, Kansas, officer had minor injuries and was taken to a hospital, she said. It was unclear how the officer was injured. On Thursday morning, Drake declined to provide any more details about the shooting, including whether Henderson was armed.

Johnson doesn’t trust the Kansas City Police Department, the agency handling the shooting investigation, citing too many recent botched police shootings on their side of the state line.

And she’s left asking the question she said her son never got an answer to, despite asking the officer multiple times: Why was he pulled over in the first place?

“He was a big man, but he was only asking what he rightfully had a right to ask,” she said.

A fear of police

When Johnson, then 17, was pregnant with Henderson, her firstborn, she was told he’d either be a big baby or a big man.

He ended up being a tiny baby, 4 pounds, 1 ounce, born at 32 weeks.

But around age 8 he shot up like a sprout, eventually growing thick and tall like the men of his family.

At Central High School, he played baseball and football, and was being scouted. One college even offered him a full-ride scholarship to play ball.

But before graduating from high school in 2016, Henderson learned about former Chiefs player Jovan Belcher killing his wife. Henderson was so disturbed by the news that he put down his dreams of playing for the Chiefs, and instead started picking up jobs around town where he could use his hands.

Until he was 18, Henderson talked about becoming a police officer.

But that dream also got shelved shortly after graduating from high school, when Henderson was walking down the block with his grandmother and happened upon a crime scene. As some officers walked his grandmother back to her home, another officer accused Henderson of walking through, or too close to, the crime scene.

One officer handcuffed and “beat” Henderson, his mother said. Henderson was initially charged with assaulting an officer, Johnson said. But the charges were later dropped after a video showed Henderson did nothing wrong, family said.

But the incident left lasting damage, according to Henderson’s family.

Until the day he died, Henderson’s wrist still gave out on him because of how one of the handcuffs was placed, Johnson said. But the most lasting scar — Henderson became terrified of police. Johnson said her son, who used to attend church with her, lost his faith in both God and in the criminal justice system.

When she picked him up from jail that day in 2016, Johnson recalled her son saying: “Mom, you said show my hands, say yes ma’am, no ma’am, but you never told me what to do if they beat me.”

The Star was not immediately able to independently confirm Henderson’s 2016 arrest.

The shooting

April had been a tight month for Henderson and Hill. So on Wednesday afternoon, with rent due the following week, the couple hopped in their shared car so Henderson could make some extra money by making a few DoorDash deliveries.

They dropped off the last order in Kansas City, Kansas’ Argentine neighborhood. Henderson stopped at a stop sign, then let his foot off the brake to go through the intersection when they saw the police lights, Hill said.

Henderson pulled over near the 12th Street bridge that crosses the Kansas River. The officer asked for his license and registration. Hill said they were never told why they were pulled over, despite asking multiple times.

Hill could see the fear in her partner as they waited for the officer to return their paperwork. She said she told the officer they were scared long before the traffic stop escalated. They had both been pulled over in the past, but this time, something felt off, Hill said. At Henderson’s request, Hill pulled out her phone and FaceTimed Johnson, who said she’d head there immediately.

In the meantime, two more police cars pulled in nearby, Hill said.

Again, they asked why they were pulled over, Hill said, and Johnson confirmed, from her vantage point on the FaceTime call. The officer, Hill said, told Henderson that he’d tell them if Henderson got out of the car. Henderson told the officer he wasn’t going to get out of the car until his mother arrived. She’d be there soon.

Johnson said she saw the officer crawl part-way into the front seat with Henderson and start “grabbing, pulling, punching, stomping.” At some point, Johnson said, Henderson started to back the car up.

“Baby, don’t run,” Johnson recalled hearing Hill say to Henderson through the FaceTime.

“But we need to be where somebody can see us,” he responded.

“Baby, it’s OK. Just go ahead and pull back over. It’s cool.” Hill remembered telling him.

“OK, baby,” he responded, turning the wheel to park again, Hill said.

A moment later one of the officers shot him twice. Henderson’s car crashed into another vehicle, Hill said.

Johnson heard the gunshots through the FaceTime video as she was driving. She watched the phone drop to the floor as Hill wailed “Why?” in the background. An officer eventually picked up the phone and hung up the call, Johnson said. In total, the FaceTime call lasted about 14 minutes.

Remembering Amaree’ya

A rhythmic rap came at the door of Johnson’s east Kansas City home late Wednesday morning.

“You got my baby’s knock,” Johnson said as she let Hill in, introducing her as Henderson’s other half.

Hill hasn’t slept since the shooting.

“As soon as I close my eyes, I’m just seeing him get shot,” she said.

Hill and Henderson met in junior high. She was mean to him at first, since she liked him. From an early age, Johnson said she could tell Hill was the love of Henderson’s life. In 2020, they officially started dating as adults.

In 2021, the same year they lost a daughter to a miscarriage, Hill and Henderson took their first trip together. It was a joyful memory amid a difficult year. They went to San Diego, despite hardly having any spending money to their name. The trip was so good they stayed a few extra days.

Henderson, who comes from grandparents with Irish, Cherokee, Blackfoot and African backgrounds, had curly hair, big dimples, and a face and neck that would glow red when he was embarrassed, his mom said.

Johnson blames herself for her kids’ love of expensive shoes. Henderson loved to dress well, and he worked hard to afford it. Johnson joked that all the employees at the Buckle at Legends knew her son.

As a single mother, Johnson raised Henderson to be respectful. To call everyone “ma’am” and “sir.” To hold open doors for those behind him. As descendants of both enslaved people and military veterans, Johnson said much of it came naturally for Henderson.

To his grieving mom, these facts highlight a painful reality — not even being taught to be respectful of authority was enough to save her son’s life, she said.

Now, she’s hoping speaking out can help counter any negative narratives that have been put out about her son since his death.

“I’m so proud of my son … he’s never committed a crime,” she said. “He’s never gave me any trouble. He’s never been in the street, none of that.”

The Star’s Bill Lukitsch contributed.