OPINION: Delta State University (DSU) first-year student Trey Reed was found hanging from a tree on campus Monday, Sept. 15. From information released Tuesday afternoon, the police pushed back against the possibility of a race-based lynching. Instead, they ruled it a suicide. However, Reed’s family will not accept that answer until a thorough investigation has been completed. Hung from a tree as a Black man, the outrage across social media is brewing.
DSU is nestled in Cleveland, Mississippi. The state’s violent history of racial murder is not to be understated when investigating deaths that mimic lynching. A large criticism is the cyclical nature of cases like this; many of which being wrongly attributed to suicide. According to much of the social media unrest, there is an anger with the police and culture at large to expect Black Americans to move past histories, while simultaneously making them relive it.
Another example of this is from Earl Smith, a Black man found hanging from a tree in the middle of the day in June 2025. The police ruled it a suicide.
30 year old Mario Kaiser Jr., a North Carolina man of color, was found dead with a noose around his neck in April 2025. No autopsy was performed. His death, ruled suicide.
Javion MaGee, a 21 year old truck driver also in North Carolina, was found dead leaning against a tree with a rope tied around his neck in 2024. The police ruled they “found no foul play”. His family’s attorney continued to fight this case, which officially has being ruled a suicide. With help from civil rights leader Bishop William Barber II, the family sought for more care. In a joint press release with MaGee’s attorneys Harry Daniels and Jason Keith, Barber spoke about the South’s history.
“We must have truth transparency in this matter… hanging is not a form of death that can be easily dismissed, particularly here in the South, where it has been used as a weapon of terror against Black families for generations,” Said Barber.
In Sept. 2023, 30 year old Yolna Lubrin was found partially nude, hanging from a tree in the backyard of her home in Florida. The police told the family that it looked to be a suicide.
“Overall, they have not done their due diligence in providing more insight, I feel like they messed up horribly,” Said Lubrin’s sister, Noami Lubrin.
Many people of color were found hanged in 2020, alone. Robert Fuller’s death was named a suicide. Malcolm Harsch’s death was named a suicide. Same with Dominique Alexander. Earlier in 2019 with Tete Gulley. Four more people of color, all deemed suicides.
2020 was a dark time in our nation’s history. There was incalculable racial violence, political insecurity and the evolution of COVID-19. With the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement prominent and visible after the murder of George Floyd, racists balanced the scales with white supremacy and the Ku-Klux-Klan (KKK) spiking alongside it. The fight that BLM led did not fix the systematic force against Black Americans in 2020, but did bring attention to the issue.
Racial violence deluged out of the 1800s, out of the 1900s and still spills out. Not in the tense times of 2020, but in 2025. The past two weeks in American history have had no limit of pain, confusion and anger. Hate is not bubbling over the sides, but surging through TikTok, Instagram, Facebook –– even YikYak. When the best case scenario is online threats, the worst case is physical violence. Even this past week, a Facebook user threatened UMaine’s LGBTQ community, which circulated through campus communities.
“Hmm. I’m only 1h20 minutes from there. Maybe I should go up there and play some old school games like smear the queer,” wrote Facebook user Ray Poulin.
The fear within the fear of attack, is that the consequences of violence are not guaranteed adjudication.
Black American history cannot be overlooked when investigating cases of hanging. The families who mourn their loved ones should not be put in a position to legally advocate for justice as well. Justice is a keystone of the American promise and should be automatically exhausted. The police would be in an unfair, racist position if they were to sweep lynchings under the rug as a suicide.
