Martinus Mitchum loved three things.
He loved the church, where you could meet him every Sunday and Thursday.
He loved children, even though he had no children.
And he loved law enforcement, the career for which he was so ambitious and the one that ended up resulting in his tragic death on Friday night.
Mitchum, a police officer at the University of Tulane and a reserve police officer for the Second City Court, worked as a security guard at a basketball game at George Washington Carver High School when he was shot and killed. Mitchum died after intervening in an altercation between John Shallerhorn and a school administrator, and the police say that Shallerhorn admitted to the police after he shot Mitchum.
“It hurts because he was one of the best,” said Lyn Clark, a former football player at O. Perry Walker High School, where Mitchum worked from 2006-2016. “They killed someone who helped so many African American students to get out of there and become something. He always supported everything. How do you take the life of someone who helped so many people that they said they would be nothing? “
Clark, now 26, was one of those people that Mitchum always checked on. But Mitchum, or “Mitch” as everyone called him, checked everyone out.
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Everyone was “my son” or “my daughter” to him.
“We always teased you and said, Mitch, you have more children than anyone else to be so young,” said Sheryl Eaglin, Mitchum’s former co-worker.
Mitchum and Eaglin started working at O. Perry Walker in 2006. He ended up becoming a family for her.
“He pissed me off like a little brother at times, but he was so genuine and there was nothing he didn’t do for those kids,” said Eaglin.
Mitchum, a Detroit native, worked as a school security guard when he started. But it didn’t last long.
“We transferred him to other positions because of how well he handled children and their other abilities,” said Tarance Davis, the school’s former sports director. Mitchum was responsible for student data and enrollment and also became the director of basketball and football operations.
In the 2013-2014 school year, O. Perry Walker merged with Landry High School to form Landry-Walker and the school won the state basketball championship in season one. It was the first of three state titles in four years for the school.
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“We probably wouldn’t have those championships we have in basketball if it weren’t for Mitch,” said Davis. “He simply has a heart for the well-being of children. He played a vital role in the organization and the administrative parts of putting that program into what it has become.”
Brian Gibson was the coach of these teams and said that they would not have done this without Mitchum, who took care of all administrative tasks. He booked hotels on road trips, made arrangements for food and did all other tasks behind the scenes.
“He was really responsible, making sure all of our business was in order,” said Gibson. “We were very successful and a lot of it was because I didn’t have to worry about these things. You think about how many kids we could send to college. He worked directly with them to make sure they got what they needed and they respected him for it. It wasn’t nothing but love with him and the children. He expected certain things and wanted it to be done in a certain way and I think the kids liked that about him. “
Because of his love for the church, many family members in his hometown of Detroit thought he would grow up to be a preacher. But law enforcement was his dream, so he pursued it. He graduated from the Slidell Police Department’s Basic Reserve Police Academy in 2014. He was also an officer at Loyola University. “(Mitchum) was a dedicated professional police officer who served the Tulane community,” Tulane officials said in a statement on Saturday.
Mitchum, who was in uniform at the time of the shooting, was taken to the University Medical Center by paramedics and was pronounced dead shortly thereafter.
“What I was most proud of was seeing the escort he got to the hospital,” said Eaglin of how the police cleared the way for the ambulance on the interstate. “He deserves it. If you could choose how you could go, it would probably be what Mitch would have chosen with the security guard. He loved to protect people, like the kids who were inside that gym. We don’t know what could have happened if that person had entered the gym with a gun. “
The sniper was refused entry to the basketball game, argued with the official, pulled the gun
Mitchum used to comment publicly on the state of law enforcement in the country. Just two days before his death, he wrote on Twitter that he supported the requirements for police officers to use body cameras and favored that police officers be removed from certification if they performed poorly or were racist.
On Thursday, he retweeted a message from Vice President Kamala Harris supporting the George Floyd Justice in Policing law, which bears the name of the man killed by the Minneapolis police in 2020 and aims to review qualified immunity for security forces, among other things.
In their own statement, Carver officials called Mitchum a “constant presence” at the school’s sporting events and watched as he sacrificed his life to do his duty.
“It is with a heavy heart … (that) we honor your memory,” said Carver’s statement.
“It is a tragic situation for … everyone who has been through this,” said Easton chairman David Garland.
Defending reporters Ramon Antonio Vargas and Della Hasselle contributed to this report.