Brenda Edwards says she cut-up son Jamal’s hoodies when he was a teen after he was stop and searched by police for being black and wearing one
Brenda Edwards said on Friday’s Loose Women that she cut up her son’s hoodies after he was stop and searched by the police for wearing one while being black.
The singer, 51, emotionally detailed how she tore up 29-year-old Jamal’s clothing as it was her ‘way of taking control of something I had no control over’ after the terrifying ordeal.
Of the incident, which appeared to have happened when her son was a teen, she explained: ‘My son he hasn’t committed any crime or anything like that and I asked him about it and he said “well I let them search me, there wasn’t anything they let me go.”
Candid: Brenda Edwards said on Friday’s Loose Women that she cut-up son Jamal’s hoodies when he was a teen after he was stop and searched by police for being black and wearing one
‘But I was more focused on “why did they stop you, did they stop you because you were black?” It turns out he was black and he was wearing a hoodie and that was apparently all that was sent out so he was stopped.
‘So, me being the protective mother that I am, I went home and cut up all the hoods off all his hoodies while he was in school.
‘I asked him can you chuck away all of your hoodies because I don’t want you to go through that ever again.’
Reasoning: The singer revealed she tore up her son’s clothing as it was her ‘way of taking control of something I had no control over’ after the terrifying ordeal (pictured in March)
Shocking: Of the incident, she explained: ‘I asked him about it and he said “well I let them search me, there wasn’t anything they let me go”
Of her reasoning, she told co-hosts Christine Lampard and Stacey Solomon: ‘He went mental when he got home but it was my way of taking control of something I had no control over.’
‘It shouldn’t have had to happen. I apologised to my son over what I did, but I had to do that.’
Brenda went on to discuss her reaction to George Floyd’s tragic death last month, and said she felt ‘shock, horror, and disgust’ when she saw the video of ex-police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on his neck for over eight minutes.
Doing what she can: Detailing her reaction after the incident Brenda added, ‘Me being the protective mother that I am, I went home and cut up all the hoods off all his hoodies’
Reaction: Of her reasoning, she told co-hosts Christine Lampard and Stacey Solomon: ‘It was my way of taking control of something I had no control over.’ ‘It shouldn’t have had to happen’
‘My last show before this was two weeks ago and that’s when I saw it, and I was at home in lockdown and I saw this video,’ she explained. ‘I was in shock, absolute shock, horror, and disgust at what I was seeing.
‘It really tugged at me when he called for his mother it just immediately made me think of my son and how that could have been my son there lying on the floor for eight minutes and 46 seconds, pleading for someone to just get off him.
‘I was crying, the wave of things that I didn’t even think were there, going back through something that happened to me in my past that I probably had blocked out.
‘It was horrific, I’m so upset and angry about it I’m finding it hard to talk about it without talk without using expletives, that’s how much it upset me.’
Upsetting: Brenda went on to discuss her reaction to George Floyd’s tragic death last month, and said she felt ‘shock, horror, and disgust’ when she saw the video of him being killed
Emotional: Detailing how it made her feel, Brenda said, ‘It really tugged at me when he called for his mother it just immediately made me think of my son’