The Mississippi Attorney General’s Office says the use of force in the officer-involved shooting that resulted in the death of a Black toddler was justified.
On June 14, Senatobia Police Sgt. Hunter Foster fired into Kohen Wiley’s family car at the local Walmart, killing the 1-year-old.
According to the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation (MBI), officers were responding to a shoplifting call. Investigators said officers saw two adults and a juvenile leaving the store and getting into a vehicle.
Officers said they attempted to stop the vehicle, but the driver allegedly drove in the direction of the cops, nearly striking one of them. That’s when Foster shot into the vehicle.
But multiple witnesses told local media they saw no such thing, confirming they saw two Black women running out of Walmart, one holding a box of diapers, the other holding the Wiley, before getting into the car.
The shooting critically injured Wiley’s aunt, who was driving the car. Doctors pronounced Wiley dead at the hospital.
Two days later, the department placed Foster on leave. The AG’s office took over the case in September.
“In this incident, the Attorney General’s Office found the use of force was justified. Pursuant to Section 45-1-6 of the Mississippi Code, the review followed an investigation by the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation,” the agency said in a statement.
Shortly after the death of Wiley, his family hired attorneys Ben Crump and Van Turner to represent them.
According to Crump, Wiley’s independent autopsy showed the bullet that hit him came through the car’s side, not the front.
Video footage from local media shows the car with a shattered passenger-side window and a bullet hole on the passenger side of the windshield, also suggesting the cop fired from the side of the car.
“This police officer is shooting from the side,” Crump said. “You can’t get that shot from the front. Why would you shoot into a vehicle from the side where you’re clearly not in harm’s way?”
Wiley’s mother, Vellesiya Wiley, said she raised her son, trying to show the officers that he was in the car. However, they still fired shots.
The Senatobia Police Department has a long history of violence and unlawful arrests against Black people.
Just two days before the incident, Foster called his co-worker, Dexter Smith, “a Black motherf–ker,” according to an internal complaint obtained by the local news outlet Mississippi Today.
In 2025, a Senatobia police officer yanked a Black woman out of her car while she was parked in a handicap spot with a handicap placard in the same Walmart where the shooting took place.
In 2023, Senatobia police arrested a 10-year-old Black boy named Quantavious Eason for public urination, which led to the firing of an officer and a lawsuit that remains pending.
The killing of Wiley also brought back another case from 2023. Video showed then-Senatobia Police Chief Richard Chandler entering Mark Lesure’s home and grabbing him by the neck.
And just last month, Police Chief Harold Vanderford resigned after private text messages showed him repeatedly using racist slurs in conversations with a colleague, including after he took command of the department last fall.
“The racist language that cost Chief Vanderford his job is exactly why this family cannot simply be told to trust the process. MBI has the footage. Release it, finish the investigation into Sgt. Foster, and give this family the facts they have been owed since the day Kohen died,” Crump said in a statement after Vanderford’s resignation.
Atlanta Black Star has contacted Crump’s office for comment on the AG’s ruling and is awaiting a response.
