London’s Black community wants police to re-investigate the death of Blessing Olusegun after its police force sprang into action following the murder of Sarah Everard, a 33-year-old woman who went missing earlier this month.
Everard, a white woman, was allegedly murdered by a Metropolitan Police officer.
After her body was discovered last week, the Met issued a slew of apologies and assurances to the public — leaving the Black community frustrated and wondering why London’s police force is not so proactive when it comes to protecting them.
“#SayHerName Blessing Olusegun! Where is the outcry, story and attention? Police probe after this beautiful Black Woman, a London student, 21, was found dead on Sussex beach,” Phyll Opoku-Gyimah, founder of UK Black Pride, tweeted.
In October, the body of 21-year-old Blessing Olusegun, a London business student, was found lying on a beach in East Sussex. Police dismissed Olusegun’s death as “unexplained,” and the Sussex Police did not treat the case as suspicious.
The police statement added that “Meanwhile, police in Sussex began an investigation of the circumstances, and the death was treated as unexplained though not suspicious at that stage… A postmortem took place on September 24, and further forensic tests were carried out in order for the cause of death to be established.” The police cited “drowning” as the reason for her death based on forensic tests. They also state that the tests found “violence or of internal or external injury.”
A petition has been started, urging the Sussex Police to reopen the case.
The Met has promised an intensive investigation into a crime committed by one of their own. The British government has also vowed to look into the Met’s handling of demonstrators at Clapham Common over the weekend–a stark difference in the way they have treated Olusegun’s case.
As her parents shout for justice, the UK police have still made no moves to right this wrong.
