The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN Post Correspondent

HOOLANDE BOUROU, Guinea - The body of Amadou Diallo was borne yesterday to the village of his ancestors, where he was laid to rest beneath a blanket of tree branches, fig leaves and sand.

Some 2,000 Guineans turned out for the burial, marking the end of a long journey of tears for family and friends of the young man who died half a world away in a burst of police gunfire.

“I know he will rest in peace here,” said Saikou Diallo, the slain street merchant’s father, following the Muslim ceremony steeped in tradition and emotion.

“I know we have the whole world with us and all I can do now is to just pray.”

The Diallo family’s final farewell to the 22-year-old police-shooting victim began in the dark, predawn hours when a convoy of 20 cars left the Guinean capital of Conakry.

A 6-hour drive took the group through a mountainous region with long, winding roads until they arrived in Labe, Guinea’s second-largest city.

Along the way, groups of villagers lined the route to pay tribute to Diallo - whose killing has outraged citizens of this West African nation.

In Labe, Amadou’s 71-year-old maternal grandfather greeted the family and Guinea’s foreign affairs minister, then joined them for the two-hour drive along a dusty, dirt road to Hoolande Bourou.

Thousands of people from Hoolande Bourou and neighboring villages - the women in colorful brocade gowns and the men in garb reserved for special occasions - met the Diallos.

The women, who wept uncontrollably, sat on mats just outside a wire fence enclosing the burial ground.

The men, who remained stoic, gathered around the simple pine coffin - placed under a melina tree and facing the Muslim holy city of Mecca.

After prayers by a local imam and storyteller, the Rev. Al Sharpton promised justice.

“As we rode to the village today, I saw little boys and girls look at the procession go by. They must have said to one another, ‘What happened to Amadou and what did he do to deserve such treatment?’

“It is an indictment to all in America if we do not get justice,” said Sharpton, the family’s adviser. “I promised his father and mother that I would go all the way until he is resting in peace and that we will fight until justice comes for the four responsible for his slaughter.

“I will come back here one day to report that justice has been achieved. I can tell you that the name of Amadou now rings for justice all over the world.”

Just before 5 p.m., Diallo’s body - wrapped in a cream-colored blanket-like cloth - was removed from the coffin and passed to six village elders, who placed it in the grave.

The men in the group then passed up leafless branches and placed them over the rectangular plot. A layer of huge fig leaves covered the branches, followed by a blanket of sand.

Diallo’s father couldn’t bear to watch. He left his son’s grave site and walked five yards to his own father’s grave, where he got down on his knees and prayed.

The Diallos, who planned to return to Conakry last night, said they were grateful for the outpouring of support - but were still wracked with grief.

“I know I should be happy that he’s resting in peace,” said Amadou’s brother, Abdul Sallam Diallo. “But there was no one as good as him … At least now his spirit is in heaven.”

The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN Post Correspondent

CONAKRY, Guinea.

THERE were smiles yesterday at the Ignace Deen Hospital - even from Kadiatou Diallo.

“It was only my third smile since my son died,” she said.

“The first was after we sacrificed a cow when we first got the news. The second was when I saw all the crowds at Newark Airport.

“And then today,” she added.

She was resplendent in a flowing aquamarine brocade boubou, elegantly embroidered. She sat next to Amadou’s father, Saikou, their adviser Al Sharpton and her children, all elegant in blue and brown African garb fashioned from brocade.

She must have felt good to be home, or at least comfortable finally under the sweltering African sun, because for the first time since her son was killed she looked genuinely relaxed.

And so, her hair covered in Muslim fashion with a white scarf, Diallo smiled at the well-wishers who came to the hospital, which held the body before the funeral, to pay their respects to her slain son, Amadou - the son who called her “Maaaam” because his stammer stopped him from saying “momma.”

They all use the same words to speak of her son’s death. They say they came to pay their respects to the parents of the man who “was slaughtered by the police in New York.”

Not just killed, or slain, or even murdered. Slaughtered.

All around this coastal city people cannot help talking about the man who left here 2 years ago with a thousand dollars in his pocket for an education in New York but returned two days ago in a wooden casket, his body riddled with 19 bullet holes.

At the port, the workers talk of the “slaughter” of Amadou Diallo; at the “Marche Niger,” the local market, the “slaughter” crops up in conversation.

In the local mosque, imams are praying that no Guinean is ever again slaughtered in the same fashion. Even at the abattoir, the local slaughterhouse, the slaughter most often referred to now is that of Amadou Diallo.

But when senior government officials, including the foreign affairs minister, Lamine Kamara, a man who is so careful with words, used the phrase repeatedly, I began to get a clearer picture of how these gentle people view this whole affair.

Most Guineans do not buy nicely packaged meat in supermarkets. They do not buy a lot of frozen fish either. They cultivate the land and cast wide fishing nets. They slaughter cows and goats - but not people. People do not get slaughtered.

While everyone agrees that what happened in the vestibule of Diallo’s Bronx apartment building on Feb. 4 should not have happened, I can understand the family’s continued disappointment with the way the system in New York has failed them up to this point.

If they view what happened to their Amadou as a death worthy only of an animal, then one can understand why 12 days later they are not satisfied with the seemingly slow pace of justice.

While they were in New York, the Diallos demanded that the four officers who fired 41 shots at their son be suspended and their guns taken away; they repeated that call yesterday.

The wheels of justice may grind slowly but, as the saying goes, justice delayed is justice denied. Even if these four officers are eventually cleared of any wrongdoing, what harm is there in taking away their guns until the investigation is completed?

A suspension would have gone a long way in helping this family - and this nation - cope.

“Yes!” Kadiatou said emphatically. “It would be a beginning.”

The grieving mother added: “But it’s going to be hard living without him and I don’t know how I’m going to cope after everyone’s gone … I don’t know what my reaction will be

The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN Post Correspondent

 

CONAKRY, Guinea - Mourners intoned Muslim funeral prayers over the plain wooden casket of Amadou Diallo yesterday - as his mother vowed he would become a “symbol” in the fight against police brutality.

“I accept that my son is dead, but I don’t want him todisappear,” said Kadiatou Diallo, dressed for the funeral in a traditional blue brocade gown.

“I want him to be a symbol for innocent victims of police brutality.”

The family of the 22-year-old immigrant who was killed by police gunfire in New York Feb. 4 congregated at the morgue at the Ignace Deen Hospital yesterday morning, where hundreds of people showed up in the intense heat to offer condolences and file past the casket.

For one of the first times in the long ordeal since her son died, Kadiatou Diallo was seen to crack a smile as relatives and old friends embraced her.

The visitors recalled the young man who was known for his religious devotion even as he relished the independence and seemingly unlimited potential of life in New York.

The day’s events were marked by a mixture of sorrow and stoicism - as the family reached a kind of emotional equilibrium following the raw anguish that greeted the parents on Monday when they brought their son’s body home from New York.

Shortly before noon the coffin was taken across town to the elaborate Faycal mosque, where the men and women separated, according to Muslim custom.

About 60 men, including Amadou’s father, brothers, uncles and cousins, close family friends, government officials and the Rev. Al Sharpton, the family’s adviser, formed a semicircle around the coffin in a small room off the mosque’s main prayer hall.

Two incense sticks were placed on the coffin - on which Diallo’s name was written in English and Arabic - and the men sat on the floor with their backs to the casket.

Under the guidance of the head imam, El-Hadj Ibrahim Bah, pages of the Koran were handed out to numerous men.

They all began reading from the holy book at once in Arabic, creating a mesmerizing, crisscrossing sing-song of scripture that rose and fell in the small space.

After nearly two hours the men had passed through an entire reading of the Koran and the prayers abruptly stopped - while others tossed Guinean francs onto the floor in a traditional gesture of thanks for the readers.

The imam then said a benediction in French for Diallo and a special prayer for Guineans who have gone abroad in search of an education, asking that they find success and return home in peace.

Afterward the mourners moved into the main prayer hall of the huge mosque - with its three elaborate domes and four minarets.

Nearly 1,000 worshipers poured in to join the family.

At this point the women were allowed in - but kept at a distance from the men in the back of the mosque - and the imam led the mourners in 45 minutes of prayer to complete the funeral service.

Before the service, as mourners paid their respects at the hospital, Kadiatou sent a somber message to Mayor Giuliani.

“The people here have seen the injustice that the mayor has done. He needs to do something about those four police officers, not come and see me,” she said.

Kadiatou and her ex-husband, Saikou Diallo, rebuffed Giuliani’s attempts to meet with them when they were in New York last week, demanding instead that he immediately suspend the cops who shot their unarmed son and take away their guns.

The policemen - who said they thought Diallo had a gun - have been put on desk duty.

Their actions are the focus of a Bronx grand jury that began hearing evidence yesterday.

Diallo’s family will leave Conakry before dawn this morning for the six-hour drive north to Hoolande Bourou, their ancestral village.

There another prayer service will be held and Diallo will be buried beside his paternal grandfather, Ibrahima Diallo.

The grandfather, a respected Guinean spiritual leader, once predicted that Diallo’s mother would bear a child “which the whole world will talk about.”

The family believes Amadou fulfilled that prophecy.

The Guinean government proposed burying Diallo in the national cemetery in the capital, but his father refused.

“We will bury him in the village,” Saikou Diallo said.

“No one will ever forget him. We will keep his memory alive.”

 

The New York Post

By Frankie Edozien

CONAKRY, Guinea.

LAURATOU Diallo held tight to her two brothers as she stood on the tarmac of Gbessia International Airport yesterday and awaited the Air France jetliner bringing home the body of Amadou Diallo.

She had arrived at the airport clad in an elegant embroidered outfit, but now, like many around her, she was wearing a simple white T-shirt emblazoned with her brother’s smiling face.

It said simply: “Amadou Diallo Memorial.”

The eldest daughter, Lauratou has been doing her duty, keeping this tight-knit family together while her parents were in New York. It is she who has been taking care of things.

Each morning, for the past few days, this 20-year-old has brought brothers Ibrahima, 16, and Abdulsallam, 15, to the Diallo compound to receive well-wishers. And they have been coming - from Gabon, from Burkina Faso, from just around the corner. They come and they cry.

Lauratou - a secretary for a local mining company - hugs them, feeds them and shows them pictures of the brother she loved so much, stoically doing the things that need to be done.

She talks about her brother, sometimes still using the present tense. After all, in her heart he is and always will be alive and well.

“Amadou always keeps your secret,” she says.

“He will never discuss things that you have said to him with someone else,” Lauratou told me as she showed me pictures of their travels in Asia.

While her brothers are quiet, even taking a break from the crowds to lie on the hammock under the baobab tree, Lauratou appears indefatigable, available to the well-wishers from dawn to way past dusk.

She has not hidden her pain, she says - she cries whenever she thinks of her slain brother. But she must have done so in private.

Lauratou, it seems, has channeled that pain into a pillar of strength while everyone around her takes turns falling apart.

Calling Lauratou a strong African queen would be an understatement.

It is crystal-clear she loved her brother so much. From what she has told me, it must have been reciprocated. When she recently got engaged, Amadou would not stop calling her, asking her if she was sure; if it was the right thing for her to do; how it would affect her career, and so forth.

“He was worried,” she says. “He just wanted me to do the right thing. He cared so much about everybody. When he came home [from Singapore] he brought gifts for everyone he knew in the family without telling anyone he had brought gifts for others.”

And then last night, the realization that Amadou would not be calling again must have hit in a new way.

The moment she set her eyes on the plain wooden coffin, she collapsed into her younger brothers’ arms.

And she wept.

Big brother Amadou would not be grilling her about her romantic choices anymore. He would no longer offer her career advice, no longer urge her and her brothers to keep praying or to help their mother, Kadiatou, as he had so often done. Whom can she confide in now?

She dissolved under a sea of tears, tears that rained down even more when she reunited with her parents minutes later. This sister’s courage and sorrow is difficult to quantify, but somehow the whole world shares her pain.

As I watched her weep, I wanted to reach out and touch her and say it was going to be all right. Then I realized, it was not.

Amadou is never coming back. The hail of police bullets in the vestibule of 1157 Wheeler Ave. on Feb. 4 ensured that.

 

The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN Post Correspondent

 

CONAKRY, Guinea - A huge crowd of mourners received the body of slain immigrant New Yorker Amadou Diallo in his native Africa yesterday with a chorus of piercing wails and grim prayers.

The litany of grief began as soon as the Air France jet from Paris touched down on the runway at Gbessia International Airport at 1:30 p.m. New York time.

A group of about 100 relatives and high government officials and their aides stood on the tarmac in the evening twilight, while thousands waited beyond a wall at the edge of the airfield.

As soon as the wheels hit the ground, women in the knot of family members began to wail in bitter anguish.

Many of the relatives wore white T-shirts bearing a picture of Diallo - the 22-year-old street peddler who died in a hail of police gunfire in the vestibule of his Bronx building on Feb. 4.

Diallo’s parents remained on the plane while the rest of the passengers deboarded and were bused to the small terminal.

Then airport workers took the plain wooden casket out of the belly of the aircraft, loaded it onto a baggage car, and drove slowly to the waiting family.

In a gripping scene, the family’s 64-year-old matriarch, Diallo’s maternal grandmother Hadja Diaray Diallo, stepped forward, dropped to her knees and placed her wrinkled hands on the coffin.

Speaking sorrowfully and soberly in the Fulah language, the old woman began to cry out a heart-wrenching recitation of praise for her dead grandson.

Behind her, Diallo’s sister, Lauratou, 20, let out a shriek of despair and, crying unremittingly, collapsed into the arms of her two brothers, Ibrahima, 16. and Abdulsallam, 15.

Cabinet ministers from the Guinean government began to intone a prayer as Diallo’s parents, Kadiadou and Saikou Diallo, emerged from the plane and walked down the stairs onto the tarmac, accompanied by the Rev. Al Sharpton.

Lauratou and her brothers dashed toward their parents and flung themselves into their arms.

After a brief reunion the family got into several cars, the casket was loaded into a minivan, and the procession made its way slowly through the huge crowd that had gathered at the airport - drawn by government-sponsored radio announcements urging Guineans to turn out en masse.

The grim convoy drove about 40 minutes across this seaside city to the Ignace Deen Hospital, which houses the morgue - and where several hundred more people had gathered.

Saikou Diallo told The Post he was deeply moved by the profound reaction to his son’s killing in New York, especially during a packed memorial service at a Manhattan mosque last week and in the 600-car motorcade that escorted them to Newark Airport Sunday.

“It was amazing. Here too there are people everywhere,” the father said.

“People have supported us our whole journey. From the moment I landed in New York until the time I got here. I’m very thankful.”

The elder Diallo reiterated his reasons for refusing to meet with Mayor Giuliani last week.

“We took a stand that until he does something about the police, we will not meet with him,” he said.

The Diallos and Sharpton have demanded the four officers who shot Diallo - who was unarmed - be suspended and that their guns be taken away.

The case will go to a Bronx grand jury as early as today. The panel will consider possible charges against the four cops - Edward McMellon, Sean Carroll, Richard Murphy and Kenneth Boss - who worked in the elite Street Crime Unit.

They have been reassigned to desk duty.

“This was an amazing response. I’ve been to Africa but … I’ve never had this feeling of having to bring home a son of Africa,” Sharpton said after meeting with government officials.

“How do you explain this to them? What do you say?

“This has raised the issue of police brutality to an international level. How can Washington ignore this whole nation’s day of mourning?” said Sharpton, who has called for a federal probe into Diallo’s killing.

Diallo’s funeral will be held today.

The family will leave Conakry at dawn tomorrow and drive several hours north to the tiny village of Hoolande Bourou, their ancestral home, where Diallo will be buried.

 

 

The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN Post Correspondent

 

CONAKRY, Guinea - A huge crowd of mourners received the body of slain immigrant New Yorker Amadou Diallo in his native Africa yesterday with a chorus of piercing wails and grim prayers.

The litany of grief began as soon as the Air France jet from Paris touched down on the runway at Gbessia International Airport at 1:30 p.m. New York time.

A group of about 100 relatives and high government officials and their aides stood on the tarmac in the evening twilight, while thousands waited beyond a wall at the edge of the airfield.

As soon as the wheels hit the ground, women in the knot of family members began to wail in bitter anguish.

Many of the relatives wore white T-shirts bearing a picture of Diallo - the 22-year-old street peddler who died in a hail of police gunfire in the vestibule of his Bronx building on Feb. 4.

Diallo’s parents remained on the plane while the rest of the passengers deboarded and were bused to the small terminal.

Then airport workers took the plain wooden casket out of the belly of the aircraft, loaded it onto a baggage car, and drove slowly to the waiting family.

In a gripping scene, the family’s 64-year-old matriarch, Diallo’s maternal grandmother Hadja Diaray Diallo, stepped forward, dropped to her knees and placed her wrinkled hands on the coffin.

Speaking sorrowfully and soberly in the Fulah language, the old woman began to cry out a heart-wrenching recitation of praise for her dead grandson.

Behind her, Diallo’s sister, Lauratou, 20, let out a shriek of despair and, crying unremittingly, collapsed into the arms of her two brothers, Ibrahima, 16. and Abdulsallam, 15.

Cabinet ministers from the Guinean government began to intone a prayer as Diallo’s parents, Kadiadou and Saikou Diallo, emerged from the plane and walked down the stairs onto the tarmac, accompanied by the Rev. Al Sharpton.

Lauratou and her brothers dashed toward their parents and flung themselves into their arms.

After a brief reunion the family got into several cars, the casket was loaded into a minivan, and the procession made its way slowly through the huge crowd that had gathered at the airport - drawn by government-sponsored radio announcements urging Guineans to turn out en masse.

The grim convoy drove about 40 minutes across this seaside city to the Ignace Deen Hospital, which houses the morgue - and where several hundred more people had gathered.

Saikou Diallo told The Post he was deeply moved by the profound reaction to his son’s killing in New York, especially during a packed memorial service at a Manhattan mosque last week and in the 600-car motorcade that escorted them to Newark Airport Sunday.

“It was amazing. Here too there are people everywhere,” the father said.

“People have supported us our whole journey. From the moment I landed in New York until the time I got here. I’m very thankful.”

The elder Diallo reiterated his reasons for refusing to meet with Mayor Giuliani last week.

“We took a stand that until he does something about the police, we will not meet with him,” he said.

The Diallos and Sharpton have demanded the four officers who shot Diallo - who was unarmed - be suspended and that their guns be taken away.

The case will go to a Bronx grand jury as early as today. The panel will consider possible charges against the four cops - Edward McMellon, Sean Carroll, Richard Murphy and Kenneth Boss - who worked in the elite Street Crime Unit.

They have been reassigned to desk duty.

“This was an amazing response. I’ve been to Africa but … I’ve never had this feeling of having to bring home a son of Africa,” Sharpton said after meeting with government officials.

“How do you explain this to them? What do you say?

“This has raised the issue of police brutality to an international level. How can Washington ignore this whole nation’s day of mourning?” said Sharpton, who has called for a federal probe into Diallo’s killing.

Diallo’s funeral will be held today.

The family will leave Conakry at dawn tomorrow and drive several hours north to the tiny village of Hoolande Bourou, their ancestral home, where Diallo will be buried.

 

The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN Post Correspondent

CONAKRY, Guinea - Amadou Diallo’s coffin will be put on display here tonight - so his grieving relatives and countrymen can pay their respects to the man whose death has fueled worldwide outrage.

Diallo’s parents, accompanied by the Rev. Al Sharpton, headed home with their son’s body yesterday and, after a stopover in Paris, were expected to arrive here today.

Thousands of people from this city of 1.1 million are expected at the airport to greet the family - spurred on by government-sponsored radio announcements urging Guineans to turn out.

Foreign Minister Kamara Lamine will lead a group of government officials dispatched to receive the parents, Kadiadou and Saikou Diallo, who are members of a prominent Guinean family.

Cabinet members in the government of Gen. Lansana Conte will carry the coffin from the Air France jet.

Diallo’s casket will then be taken by hearse to the Ignace Deen Hospital where mourners will be allowed to file past.

Tomorrow morning, the family of the 22-year-old immigrant who made his living selling videotapes on 14th Street in Manhattan, will be at the hospital to receive the condolences of mourners.

At 8:30 a.m. New York time tomorrow, a Muslim funeral service - attended only by men - will be held at the Foycal mosque, the largest in the country.

Later in the day, the family will drive with the casket four hours to the northern region of Lelouma, spending the night at Labe, Guinea’s second-largest city.

At dawn Wednesday, Diallo will be buried in a Muslim ceremony in the tiny village of Hollande-Bouroy, the family’s ancestral home.

Meanwhile yesterday, mourners streamed into the Conakry compound of Diallo’s 64-year-old maternal grandmother, Hadja Diaray Diallo.

Women in brightly colored gowns, their hair covered by simple white cloths, and men in knee-length caftans gathered in the shade of the immense baobab tree in the compound’s center.

Frequently, a visitor collapsed in wails of grief, and one of Diallo’s siblings would rush to console them.

Diallo’s uncle, Oury Diallo, 28, said Amadou had recently qualified for a credit card, which he hoped to use to open an America Online account which would allow him to communicate by e-mail with his family.

“He was really impressed with the way things were organized in New York,” Oury Diallo, an engineer, said.

“He always said, ‘If you do things right in this city, things will work out,’” the uncle said.

“He had such a large personality and was always giving. The one consolation that we have here in Guinea is that people in New York care and have been demanding answers.”

The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN Post Correspondent

 

CONAKRY, Guinea.

IT MAY not be easy at first to comprehend why a 22-year-old well-traveled son of an upper-middle-class West African family would love a life of street-peddling in the Big Apple.

But after talking with relatives of Amadou Diallo and walking through the streets of this seaside peninsula that his family called home, I could understand why he chose a humble existence in New York.

Conakry - a bustling metropolis dotted with palms and baobab trees - is filled with businesses bearing the Diallo name. Amadou Diallo, named after his grandfather, a retired government official, just wanted to do it on his own.

His parents are well-known here for their success in the gem trade. At least in New York, he wasn’t under anyone’s shadow.

“He just wanted to earn enough money to study computers,” his grief-stricken sister, Lauratou, told me in the living room of the sprawling family compound here.

“He just wanted to be independent.”

The Diallos are a large, prominent family in a small country where the majority of the population is without gainful employment.

Amadou and his siblings were privileged, educated in a global fashion. They are multilingual and have been in far-flung corners of the Earth. They carry themselves regally yet with an air of humility.

Even in these sad times, the Diallos stand out from most people in Guinea I have seen. One can tell from the clothes, the cellular phones and the poignant humility they exude that they are indeed a rare breed.

Rich, but way down to earth.

Amadou, it seems, was a gem of a person who wanted his star to shine on his own merit. What better place to try to make it on your own than New York City, a place that has been welcoming that special kind of immigrant for years?

“He loved it there, and he always wanted to go,” said his uncle, Alpha-Oumar Diallo, a high-school teacher, as he comforted his mother, Hadja Diaray Diallo, the 64-year-old family matriarch, under a baobab tree.

“He was so humble. He would never act like his parents had money. Amadou was the most ordinary person,” his uncle said.

And in a family where longevity is the norm, his shocking “murder” at age 22 has turned the entire clan upside down.

“We love Americans and America, so this is such a shock to us, and no one here can understand this,” he said.

The slain man’s younger bother, Ibrahima, 16, a towering high-school senior who plays basketball, also had dreams of coming to America, maybe even to New York for college.

“I am not so sure now,” he said, the pain etched on his face.

I can relate to Diallo’s dream.

Not too many years ago, I was one of those new New Yorkers. I left the same West African coast as Diallo with dreams of acquiring a New York education. My dreams came true.

For Diallo, those dreams evaporated when he was hit 19 times in a fusillade of 41 bullets in the vestibule of his Bronx apartment building by elite street-crimes officers who cops say were looking for a vicious rapist.

As his kin and countrymen wait for his remains to arrive later today, they can only wonder what really happened to one of their brightest young men.

And how a promising life could be tragically cut short in a city that made him so happy.

There are many lessons to be learned here. But whatever the facts of this case, nothing can replace the son and the brother they lost.

But they will cling to the memory that up until his last moments he was happy, chasing his dreams.