The town of Senatobia, Miss, added another tragedy to its resume of racial incidents this summer, when one-year-old Kohen Wiley was killed in an officer-involved shooting on June 14.
It started when city police were summoned to a shoplifting allegation involving Pampers Easy Ups diapers. The Tate County Sheriff’s Department was already on site regarding a separate incident involving sexual harassment.
The police approached two Black women as they left the store and, after entering their vehicle, they prepared to leave the parking lot. Conflicting reports suggest the car was driven in the direction of the officers or was attempting to exit the parking lot. An eight-year veteran, Sgt. Hunter Foster then fired several shots into the vehicle, killing a child in the passenger seat and wounding the driver, who was taken to a hospital in critical condition.
The child’s mother, Vellesiya Wiley, maintains she held her son up in her arms to show an infant was in the vehicle.
Foster, who has been suspended without pay, has several past negative incidents in his career, including excessive force and falsifying reports.
Lawyers, including celebrated civil rights icon Ben Crump, have been retained by the child’s father. Crump hired an independent pathologist who determined the child sustained a gunshot wound to his right torso and an exit wound on his left side. The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation, which handles all major crimes within the state, is overseeing the case.
Meanwhile, Foster’s body cam video, dash cam, and the Walmart store surveillance footage have not been released, leading to increased unrest since the incident.
Located in northern Mississippi, Senatobia has had its share of racially motivated encounters with law enforcement in recent years. These include a Black woman taken to the ground and handcuffed by police, and threatened with a taser in a dispute over a handicapped parking space at the same Walmart in 2025. Other allegations of harassment against Black minors have been raised by community leaders.
