“Not guilty.” That was the verdict granted to Rick Chow, 61, in the shooting death of 14-year-old Cyrus Carmack-Belton, bringing more tears to a grieving Black family, pain and heartache to the community of Columbia, South Carolina, and outrage to Black people across the country.
In the conclusion of a multi-day trial, jurors deliberated for approximately eight hours before reaching a verdict. The verdict was handed down on June 1.
“I’ve been practicing law for almost 30 years. I’ve never seen anything like this. I don’t understand it. I’m at a loss to explain it to his father, Troy, standing beside me. I’m at a loss to explain it to his mother, who couldn’t take it and had to leave.
I’m at a loss to explain it to his family, because I too don’t understand it,” the Carmack/Belton family attorney, Todd Rutherford, said in a statement to reporters that night.
On May 28, 2023, Cyrus Carmack-Belton walked into an Xpress Mart Shell station then owned by Rick Chow, who is Asian. While inside of the store, Cyrus was followed and watched closely by Mr. Chow’s wife, Alice Chow, according to surveillance footage.
Video footage shows the teen opening a refrigerated container door and taking out four bottles of water then immediately putting all four bottles back inside. After being questioned by Ms. Chow and her son, Andy Chow, on whether he had taken a water bottle, Cyrus shook out his hoodie then left the store.
Mr. Chow, accompanied by his then 20-year-old son, followed the teen out and pursued him for more than 100 yards, roughly the length of a football field, before fatally shooting him in the back.
“The anger is palpable tonight. You can feel it, you can touch it, because people saw a child that looked like their own, that did nothing wrong, a child that all the witnesses described had fear in his eyes when he left the store,” Atty. Rutherford said.
“He started to run as two grown men chased him down over a football field and shot him dead. This should not happen. This makes us feel as if our children don’t matter, and they do. This makes us feel like Cyrus’s life did not matter, and it did.”
Protests, rallies, memorials and vigils were held in the days following the verdict, including demonstrations outside of both the gas station and the South Carolina State House.
“It was devastating for me to get a call from Alvin S. Glenn [Detention Center] letting me know that Rick Chow was released. That broke me more than you can ever imagine, because [the] murderer of my son was set free, and it’s not fair, and it’s unjust,” Cyrus’ mother, Nicole Carmack, said at a June 3 gathering at the site where her son was killed.
She described her son as strong, smart, loving and kind and expressed her thoughts that the entire Chow family should be held accountable.
“Every day I will not be able to speak to my son, hear his voice change, see him grow, go to prom. He will never get married. I will never hold my grandchildren. Nothing,” she said. “But Chow is able to go home with his lying son, Andy Chow, and they’re able to have dinner with the wife, Alice.”
The trial
Kinnedy Carson was sitting inside her mother’s SUV when she saw Cyrus running with two men behind him. “His eyes were big,” she said to the 12 jurors during the trial, according to WLTX, Columbia’s CBS affiliate. “His shoe had fell off, and he was holding his pants up with one hand and pumping his arms with the other.”
In the aftermath of the fatal shooting, Mr. Chow accused Cyrus of stealing a water bottle, and claimed the teen pointed a gun at his son and said he acted in defense.
Investigators with the Richland County Sheriff’s Department said surveillance video showed Cyrus had not stolen anything from the store, and prosecutors argued that Rick Chow and his son, Andy Chow, created the confrontation by leaving the store and chasing the teen, according to WLTX.
In addition, witnesses Kinnedy Carson and her mother, Lori Ann Carson, testified they never saw a gun pointed at Rick Chow or Andy Chow, according to the media outlet.
Richland County Sheriff’s Department deputy Derrick English, one of the first deputies to respond after the shooting, testified that while a handgun was recovered near Cyrus, witnesses did not initially tell deputies they saw Cyrus point a gun, the media outlet reported.
Fifth Circuit Solicitor Byron Gipson asked jurors: “In what world do you get to falsely accuse a 14-year-old of stealing? Chase a 14-year-old 130-plus yards down the road while you’re armed with a pistol. Shoot that person in the back, then claim you’re defending your son?”
Next steps in fight for justice
Richland County is nearly 50% Black, and Columbia is about 41% Black, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Seven of the 12 jurors in the case were Black.
Still, critics raised concerns about what took place inside the courtroom, as Mr. Chow’s prior history was not brought up during the trial. South Carolina law generally prevents prosecutors from introducing prior crimes, wrongs or other acts to argue that a defendant acted in accordance with a past pattern of behavior.
According to The State, a South Carolina newspaper, Mr. Chow was involved in two prior reported shooting incidents, one in 2015, when he fired six shots into the side of a vehicle, and another in 2018, when he fired two shots at a person identified as an alleged shoplifter, striking the person in the leg.
“He’s had multiple accounts, assaults, accounts caught on video, and this is not even the first shooting that was reported on him. This is just the first time that we’ve had a fatality,” Nation of Islam Student Minister Anthony Muhammad of Mosque No. 38 in Columbia said to The Final Call. “It took someone to actually die to put some attention on this man.”
Cyrus’ parents, Troy Belton and Nicole Carmack, filed a civil lawsuit in July 2024 with similar allegations. The complaint alleges that Rick, Andy and Alice Chow had a pattern of intimidating, threatening and harassing customers whom they suspected of shoplifting. It also argues that Shell and the business entities operating the store failed to prevent those practices.
Mr. Belton and Ms. Carmack are seeking damages from Mr. Chow and his family, Shell USA and related business entities, including Grene Investments, Grenefrog Stores and Xpress Mart.
The lawsuit alleges that Cyrus was a lawful customer in the store when he was racially profiled, falsely accused of shoplifting, unlawfully detained, chased and ultimately killed. It brings eight legal claims, including negligence and recklessness, wrongful death, intentional infliction of emotional distress, civil conspiracy, false imprisonment, assault and battery and kidnapping.
Cyrus’ parents are seeking compensatory damages, punitive damages, funeral and related expenses, damages for emotional distress and grief, attorney’s fees and costs and a jury trial.
The civil suit was put on hold until the criminal case concluded. After the not guilty verdict, the family’s attorney, Todd Rutherford, said the family would be moving forward with the lawsuit.
“Rick Chow, while found not guilty, we’re still going to sue him. He owes. He owes for what he did to Cyrus. He owes for what he did to the family. He owes for what he did to this community,” Atty. Rutherford said in his statement following the verdict.
“What he did was wrong. He took a life that he should not have. He had no reason—no one ever does—to chase a child 130 yards and shoot them in the back. I don’t care what that jury said.
There is no justification for that. It should never happen again, and it is not open season on Black people for anybody to feel like they should be able to do it, because the jury found him not guilty.”
Black-Asian relations in the midst of tragedy
In a June 9 statement, Stop AAPI Hate, an organization exposing and combating racism and discrimination against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the U.S., condemned the shooting of Cyrus and called for cross-racial solidarity.
“Cyrus’ death was a tragedy then, and it remains a tragedy today in the wake of Chow’s acquittal,” the statement said. “As Asian Americans, we can’t look away from the questions this case raises or the tensions it inflames. From Cyrus Carmack-Belton in South Carolina to Latasha Harlins in California, too many Black children have lost their lives over too little.”
Latasha Harlins was a 15-year-old Black girl who was shot in the back of the head by a Korean convenience store owner in 1991.
“That history demands self-reflection about anti-Blackness within Asian American communities. Anti-Black racism—just like anti-Asian racism—is a tool of White supremacy that divides communities of color against each other, reinforces racial hierarchies and encourages people to see one another as threats instead of allies. We must not give into it,” the statement said.
The group also called on Asian Americans to condemn the death of Cyrus Carmack-Belton and the “miscarriage of justice that allowed Rick Chow to walk free.”
The root of anti-Blackness is fomented and rooted in White supremacy that has engulfed the entire world.
The Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad also teaches Black people to unite and “do for self,” which the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan has commented about Asian communities for being able to do.
“Did you know that if we just spent one-tenth of 1 percent of what we spend for these holidays with Black businesses, they would be able to hire thousands of Black people, giving them jobs? Imagine if we knew how to invest the money that we would save; we could be free, justified and equal, building our own economic base,” Minister Farrakhan stated in a 2015 Message titled, “Why We Are Calling You To Boycott Christmas.”
In the same message he points to the example of Asian and other communities and how the spend money with their own people.
“Did you know that the money that we get out of our economy, $1.1 trillion to $1.3 trillion, we spend it almost as fast as we get it? I was shocked when I heard some statistics; that: The Asian people, Chinatown, Koreatown:
Their money circulates in their community nearly a whole month before it goes. The Jewish people: Their money circulates in their community for 20-some days before it leaves. Even our Mexican family:
They are better than we, in turning their money around in their own community. But when I heard that our money leaves in six hours: Where did that come from?” Minister Farrakhan pointed out.
Following the South Carolina verdict, Black people are pointing out the need to establish and support Black businesses.
“We must unite and do for self. Spend with ourselves before we can go and spend with another. The Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad even tells us in ‘Message to the Blackman in America’ that we must find those with like minds and go into business with one another and not have wanton criticism of Black owned businesses,” Student Minister Anthony Muhammad said. “Stop going into places where you’re not wanted,” he continued.
“Keep the Black dollar within the Black community,” said Student Minister Anthony Muhammad. “We must unite. The Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad said our unity is more powerful than an atomic or hydrogen bomb. We must take that into consideration.”