Tell-It Report: A Bronx Mother Demands Answers After Her Teen Daughter Died In NYPD Custody

Police say Saniyah Cheatham, 18, hanged herself with her sweater in a holding cell, but her mother says she wasn’t wearing a sweater that day.

(Envato/ContrabandCamp)

In Gullah Geechee communities, a "tell-it" was a designated lookout, community warning system and the most trusted source for news and information. The Tell-It Report is ContrabandCamp’s weekly roundup of the Black stories that deserve more attention — from politics to entertainment.

The death of 18-year-old Saniyah Cheatham is being investigated after she was found unresponsive in a Bronx cell shortly after being arrested on July 4. Her family wants answers.

An appeals court has ruled that Michael Sockwell’s rights were violated in a 1990 trial in Alabama in which 80% of potential Black jurors were dismissed.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans have filed a lawsuit against Stone Mountain Park for a new “Truth-Telling” exhibit that will highlight enslavement through segregation.

Read the full stories below:

A Bronx mother demands answers after her daughter dies in police custody

A mother is calling foul on claims that her 18-year-old daughter took her own life while being held at a police station in the Bronx on July 5.

Saniyah Cheatham was arrested on July 4 after getting into a physical fight with her girlfriend, who was also arrested. According to NBC 4, police said that officers performed CPR on the teen after she was found unconscious in the cell shortly before 1 a.m. She was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital shortly after. It was unclear if she was in the cell by herself or with others.

Though an autopsy is still pending, two officials claim that Saniyah hanged herself with her sweater in the cell, The New York Times reports.

Her mother, Thomasina Cheatham, said that the teen didn’t even have a sweater on that day. She was with her daughter hours prior to her arrest at a Fourth of July cookout.

"What happened to her? I don’t believe she killed herself," she told NBC 4. "Maybe she said something they didn’t like, they roughed her up. I don’t believe my daughter committed suicide."

The family told Fox 5 that Saniyah didn’t have any history of suicidal behavior and that they’ve been receiving too many conflicting stories from officers.

The Force Investigation Division is currently investigating Saniyah’s death. Thomasina is calling for the surveillance footage to be released.

Her 17-year-old brother, Javan Cheatham, told the Times that she was working towards a high school equivalency diploma and was working to move into an apartment by herself and pursue higher education.

Ember Baez, who had been in a long-term relationship with Saniyah (the couple parted ways last year), echoed Thomasina’s sentiments to the Times, noting that the teen had been happy.

“She was my backbone — she kept me sane,” Baez said. “I knew that, a year or two from now, I would have the biggest thing to look forward to: being back with her.”

Sons of Confederate Veterans sue over new civil rights exhibit at Stone Mountain

A racist group is trying to stop new civil rights exhibitions at Stone Mountain Park outside of Atlanta from being installed.

The Warner Museum proposed a “Truth Telling” exhibit dedicated to tracing Black history from enslavement through segregation. The project, to be positioned at Memorial Hall, would highlight Shermantown and the Civil Rights Movement. The Georgia branch of Sons of Confederate Veterans filed a lawsuit against Stone Mountain Park on July 1, according to 11 Alive Atlanta.

According to the lawsuit, the Sons of Confederate Veterans argue that plans for the exhibit violate state law because it says the Stone Mountain Memorial Association is to "maintain an appropriate and suitable memory for the Confederacy."

Martin O’Toole, the chapter’s spokesperson, told the Associated Press, “When they come after the history and attempt to change everything to the present political structure, that’s against the law.”

Stone Mountain features prominent carvings honoring Confederate President Jefferson Davis, Gen. Robert E. Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, etched in 1915. Over the years, as nationwide calls to remove Confederate monuments continued, the Stone Mountain Memorial Association voted to relocate Confederate flags and publicly acknowledge the park’s role in reigniting the Ku Klux Klan. In 2023, Georgia’s General Assembly allocated $11 million, which the association used to create the exhibit with the Warner Museum.

The 10-gallery exhibit aims to “explore how the collective memory created by Southerners in response to the real and imagined threats to the very foundation of Southern society, the institution of slavery, by westward expansion, a destructive war and eventual military defeat, was fertile ground for the development of the Lost Cause movement amidst the social and economic disruptions that followed,” according to the proposal.

The exhibit will also address the role of the United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Sons of Confederate Veterans in carrying on the myth of the “Lost Cause,” the AP reports. The exhibit will also highlight stories of the Black community that lived near the mountain’s base after the Civil War.

The state filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit on July 2, stating, "The Petition does not assert any different factual or legal basis for mandamus or injunctive relief,” according to 11 Alive.

Appeals court says a death row inmate’s constitutional rights were violated three decades after his trial

Michael Sockwell has been on death row for three decades, but he may have a second chance with a retrial after a new ruling.

A federal appeals court ruled that Alabama prosecutors violated the 62-year-old’s rights in the case where he was sentenced to death in 1990. The court said that 80% of potential Black jurors were rejected from serving on the trial compared to only 20% of potential white jurors, according to the Associated Press.

The three-judge panel wrote a 2-1 opinion that said prosecutors violated his 14th Amendment right, denying him due process when they “repeatedly and purposefully struck Black jurors, making only dubious and capricious excuses,” according to The New York Times. The June 30 decision makes Sockwell eligible for a retrial.

He was convicted in the 1988 killing of Montgomery County Sheriff Isaiah Harris. Prosecutors argued that Harris’ wife hired Sockwell to kill the sheriff to cover up an affair and collect insurance money, the AP reports. Sockwell and one other man were offered $100 for the job and more if they were successful, according to WSFA.

Sockwell pleaded not guilty. He testified during the trial that cops threatened him and deprived him of food and water before he recorded a videotape confessing to the crime. He also testified that the man Harris’ wife was having an affair with killed the sheriff, according to the AP.

The jury sentenced Sockwell to life in prison, but the judge in the 1990 trial overrode their decision and gave him the death penalty. Alabama judges are no longer legally allowed to override a jury’s decisions in capital murder cases.

One of Sockwell’s attorneys, Michael Rayfield, told the Times in a statement, “Michael has been denied his right to a fair trial for 35 years.” He continued, “We’ll continue to fight for his freedom.”

ICYMI

The Philadelphia city workers’ strike has come to an end after the AFSCME District Council 33 reached a tentative agreement with the city. Trash collection will resume on Monday.

The inaugural season for the Tennessee State men's hockey team, the first ever at an HBCU, has been halted before it can even begin due to a lack of resources and financial constraints.

The National Association of Black Journalists has declined to invite President Donald Trump to its convention in Cleveland.

Carla Hayden, the former Librarian of Congress abruptly fired by the Trump administration, has been hired as the senior fellow at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Kendrick Lamar’s discography will be studied in a new course at Temple University starting this fall.

Lead soloist of the Mississippi Mass Choir and gospel legend Mama Mosie Burks died on July 7 at age 92.

Former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. is exploring a political comeback.