Antonio Mays Jr. was sixteen years old when he traveled a thousand miles to join the racial justice protests of the summer of 2020. He arrived in Seattle at the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest — known as CHOP. Less than a week later, he was shot and killed there.
That was six years ago. The case is still unsolved.
No arrests have been made. No charges have been filed. Mays had crossed the country to be part of a movement; he died inside the protest zone that briefly held national attention as a symbol of that movement.
The killing was examined as part of a joint investigation by NPR, KUOW, and The Seattle Times, published June 4, 2026 — the podcast and reporting project titled We Keep Us Safe.
What the investigation found, and whether it points toward any suspect or systemic failure, hasn’t been summarized in full public detail. But the basic facts remain unchanged from what Seattle authorities and journalists documented in 2020: a teenager showed up, was shot, and the person who pulled the trigger has never been publicly identified.
Originally reported by NPR, KUOW, and The Seattle Times. Read the original report.
