By Megan Sayles
AFRO Staff Writer
msayles@afro.com
Prince George’s County, Md. resident Marion Gray-Hopkins created the Coalition of Concerned Mothers (COCM) in 2015 to cultivate a safe space for mothers who’ve lost children to police and community violence. The organization not only provides a community for grieving mothers to heal, it also supports families in seeking justice and accountability, while advocating for legislative reforms to foster safer communities.
Gray-Hopkins was motivated to start COCM after the untimely death of her 19-year-old son, Gary Hopkins, at the hands of law enforcement in November 1999. Gary Hopkins, a college student and part-time nursing home worker, was fatally shot by Prince George’s County police after he helped to break up a fight outside of a dance at a Lanham, Md., fire station.
“My husband and my son had always told me how very strong I was, and it gave me the fuel that I needed to begin to fight for others,” said Gray-Hopkins. “I’ve always said that this is not Gary’s fight, or Marion’s fight or the Hopkins family fight. This is a fight for all of us because if it could happen to Gary, it could happen to anyone.”
Though unarmed, officers claimed Garry Hopkins was a threat. One pulled him from a car, and another shot him in the chest. No officers were ever held criminally accountable.
Just 16 days before her son’s death, Gray-Hopkins lost her husband to metastatic bone cancer. Gary Hopkins only went to the dance that night after his supervisor at the nursing home, seeing how deeply he was grieving, encouraged him to go.
“I was devastated of course, but I didn’t have time to think, ‘Oh, woe is me.’ I got into this fight because I needed to do it for Gary, for my husband, for my other children, for my nieces and my nephews,” said Gray-Hopkins. “I had to try to do something to say that I’m not going to allow Gary’s death to be in vain.”
Losing a loved one as a result of law enforcement action is all too common for the Black community. According to the latest report from Mapping Police Violence, at least 1,260 people were killed by police in 2024. Twenty-five percent of them were Black, though African-Americans only make up 13 percent of the population.
COCM empowers impacted mothers to lean on one another and affirm each other’s experiences and emotions. One of the group’s biggest priorities is to end qualified immunity, a legal doctrine that often protects police officers from being personally sued—even when they violate someone’s rights.
Rhanda Dormeus, treasurer of COCM, believes qualified immunity only exists to keep law enforcement from facing meaningful consequences.
“From my perspective, qualified immunity was birthed to cover up bad behavior,” said Dormeus. “They want to protect people who are doing wrong in the capacity of them being employed.”
Dormeus’ 23-year-old daughter, Korryn Gaines, was fatally shot by a Baltimore County police officer on Aug. 1, 2016, after an hours-long standoff at her Randallstown, Md., apartment.
Officers had entered her home using a key to serve a warrant related to a minor traffic violation. Gaines, who was in the midst of a mental health crisis and legally owned a shotgun, armed herself, fearing for her safety. Police also shot and wounded Gaines’ 5-year-old son during the incident. Despite Dormeus’ repeated pleas to speak with her daughter and her efforts to involve Gaines’ therapist, police refused her requests.
Gaines’ family filed a civil lawsuit against the county and the officer who killed her, Cpl. Royce Ruby Jr., in 2018, ultimately winning a $38 million jury verdict. However, the decision was later overturned when a judge, who was a former police officer, granted Ruby qualified immunity, ruling that his use of deadly force did not violate a clearly established constitutional right. This came after the jury had already ruled that Ruby was not entitled to qualified immunity.
“The loss of a child is something that no one can prepare themselves for. I don’t care if it’s due to sickness or an accident, but I think the difficult aspect of it is to have someone intentionally kill your child,” said Dormeus. “That’s the gut punch.”
For Dormeus, it’s an unspoken understanding that binds the women of COCM together. They don’t need words; sometimes, a shared glance or quiet tears are enough to communicate their grief.
“You need to surround yourself with people who will help you fight through this pain, and that’s what the coalition gives me,” said Dormeus. “They give me hope, and that’s all we want. We want hope.”
