Amid the anger over the death of Michael Brown, a different family stood in shock and grief over the death of another young black man: DeAndre Joshua, 20. At 9 a.m. Tuesday, a resident of an apartment complex spotted Joshua’s body inside a parked car, a white Pontiac Grand Prix, near Canfield Green Apartments, the same complex where Ferguson Police officer Darren Wilson shot Brown on Aug. 9. Blood-soaked shattered glass lay in a pile on the ground beside the car.
Family members said Joshua’s death is tied to the protests that consumed Ferguson after St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch revealed the grand jury’s decision not to indict Wilson. But family members said they did not know specifically how he died.
“I’m still stunned because he never had any problems. He was a good kid,” relative Brian Joshua, 45 said, as other family members sobbed. “It’s like somebody just hit us with a brick.” DeAndre Joshua graduated from high school and worked at Walmart, he said.
Walmart said Joshua had worked at Walmart as a stocker for more than a year. “We are deeply saddened to learn the news that one of our Walmart family members tragically lost his life,” Dacona Smith, senior vice president for operations at Walmart, said.
As police towed Joshua’s car, his grandmother Renita Towns said she had little hope that police would investigate and learn the cause of her grandson’s death.”Police don’t care — he’s black,” Towns said.
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