♪ this is "nightline." >> tonight, justice for jayland. a young black man dead at the hands of police, wounded at least 60 times in a fatal shooting. fueling protests and a family's painful search for answers. >> he was a human being. and we'd like to know why he's shot down like a dog. >> the images police say show jayland walker shot at them during a car chase. the promise today from president biden as america's racial reckoning over police and the use of force continues. and road to recovery. her memorable on-screen moments include "remember the titans." >> let's go to state, coach.

>> and the hit series "nashville." now hayden panettiere is opening up for the first time about her offscreen battles. >> i didn't know where the alcoholism was ending and the postpartum was beginning. >> why she's grateful for her daughter and ready to reprise her role in the next "scream." the rise of the gentle minions. it's the tiktok trend featuring well-dressed teens celebrating the return of gru and his minions. >> this is the biggest day of my life! >> why it's driving some moviegoers crazy. ♪

thanks for joining us. tonight, the fatal police shooting of a black man in akron, ohio, that has left yet another city divided and grieving. a family demanding answers. eight officers opened fire on 25-year-old jayland walker when he fled on foot following a car chase. but questions remain about what happened leading up to that deadly confrontation. here's abc's t.j. holmes. >> i won't be able to see him again, hug him again, just remind him that i love him or anything like that. it really hurts. >> reporter: jada walker is preparing to bury her baby brother, 25-year-old jayland walker, killed in a hail of

bullets fired by akron, ohio, police on june 27th. >> can you tell me about your baby brother? >> cool dude. very funny. you know. very smart. you know, just-well-rounded. i may be biased, but to me he was really the perfect person. he was my brother. a brother to many others. but he was mine. and that was my boy. >> reporter: authorities released body camera footage from the night of the incident. they say it started as a routine traffic stop but walker gave chase, evading officers who claim he fired a shot at them from his car. police say gun was recovered in the car but was not on walker when he was killed. the walker family left with little comfort and few answers about how and why police shot jayland. you know that video is out there. are you just not ready to see it yet? >> no. i shouldn't say i don't want to, but i just can't fathom to see

any sort of video of him being gunned down that amount of times, you know, as if he was just -- just like aim practice. >> jayland was a sweet young man. he didn't raise his voice. he didn't like confrontation. whatever they portray negatively about jayland, it can't be. we know him. we know him. and he's not like that at all. >> i am a former prosecutor. i've been in litigation for 22 years. i've never seen anything like this. the kind of force used against one man is unbelievable. he was an american. and he was black. and too many american black men are dying this way. >> reporter: an initial medical examiner report shows walker sustained over 60 wounds to his body after eight officers fired on him. >> we want justice! >> reporter: another troubling and tragically familiar shooting death of a black man at the

hands of law enforcement. >> it was overkill. jayland walker was not black, we probably would not have seen those particular bullets come out in that way. >> reporter: walker's death ignited protests and calls for change. >> we haven't been through anything like this. we see these things in the headlines all the time. and now it's at our doorstep. he was a human being. and we'd like to know why he's shot down like a dog. simple as that. >> reporter: over the holiday weekend, officials revealed the distressing details that led to walker's fatal shooting, all captured on police body cameras. >> the video you're about to watch is heartbreaking and it's very tough to take in. >> reporter: police say walker refused to pull over for a traffic and equipment violation june 27th, leading officers on a seven-minute chase through the city. >> what was going to be a routine traffic stop, which would probably result either in a warning or citation being issued, turned into a pursuit. >> when they're in pursuit, they don't know what you have. people use the word "routine traffic stop." there is no routine, every one

is different. >> reporter: at one point officers report gunfire from walker's car which police say highway cameras captured. >> shots fired, the vehicle just had a shot come out its door. >> a shot's fired, that changes the nature of the contact. >> reporter: he jumps from the car, wearing a ski mask. officers try tasing walker. seconds later police say he turned and motioned toward his waist area, which triggered a hail of police fire. walker wasn't carrying a gun at that time. >> each officer independent of each other related that they felt that mr. walker had turned and was motioning and moving into a firing position. >> reporter: investigators are still trying to determine exactly how many rounds the officers fired. >> based on the video, i anticipate that number to be high. a lot of rounds were fired. >> i hear the audio. then you hear the shots. you hear a lot of them. this is a phenomenon we call

contagious shooting, where others fire when perceived with a threat because their partners are firing as well, at the same time. and you really don't know if that individual is shooting at you or not because your perception is changed from the sounds. >> reporter: robert boyce, former chief of detectives for nypd, believe officers followed training protocols. >> someone fires at a police officer, that's attempted murder, that's a whole different circumstance. i'm saying outside of the enormous amount of shots fired, i didn't see anything where they stepped out of line. they did their job. >> reporter: police say they found a gun flexion to a loaded magazine and a gold ring. >> at the time of the shooting, he was unarmed. >> i've never known him to own a gun of any sort at all. he never brought it to my attention. the last thing i would have imagined him having with him is a gun. >> reporter: the investigation is now being conducted by the ohio state attorney general's office and also monitored at the federal level. >> if the evidence reveals

potential violations of federal criminal statutes, the justice department will take the appropriate action. >> reporter: the eight officers directly involved in the shooting have been placed on paid administrative leave. >> they've got to be ready to explain why they did what they did. they need to be able to articulate what specific threats they were facing. >> reporter: police killed 1,136 people in 2021. 28% were black despite being only 13% of the population. >> the gallivanization people have for protesting and mobilization around george floyd's murder, even before that, i mean, thinking about freddie gray, michael brown, sandra bland. the list could go on and on. that did not translate into policy changes at the federal level. >> reporter: raysean ray leads a virtual reality training program for law enforcement at the university of maryland. >> it's about policy as well. this is how they are trained to respond. the problem comes up when we

look at other cases where people have behaved similarly or potentially worse than what jayland did. and of course, we could go to highland park where we see that individual, after killing people, apprehended peacefully that happen to be white. jayland, of course, is black. >> reporter: as the walker family continues to fight for justice, they're pleading with the public to join them peacefully. the city of akron today lifting its two-night curfew after declaring a state of emergency earlier this week. >> we ask that, if you truly love jayland, and if you truly want the truth, please show respect, dignity, and do it peacefully. we want this thing to be done right, in the right way, at all times. >> reporter: just before his death, walker was coping with his own grief after his fiancee died a month earlier in a hit-and-run car accident. there have been no arrests in that case so far. do you see much of a change in

your brother after his fiancee passed? >> he wasn't the type of person to let what he's going through affect those around him. >> reporter: the family is now preparing to commemorate his death just weeks before he would have turned 26. his sister now left with a memory of their last time together just a day before he died. what was your last exchange with your brother? >> we just told each other that we love each other. and then, you know -- that following day, you get that sort of news. i'll always remember us just, you know -- we never left on bad terms, always reminding each other that we love each other. >> how do you have do you still go back to that moment? >> every day. it won't leave my mind. >> our thanks to t.j. up next, actress hayden panettiere opens up about her

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♪ at just 32, actress hayden panettiere has already been a fixture in theaters and in our living room for decades. but her public celebrity was put on hold so she could take on a private battle with addiction. now she tells abc's kaylee hartung she's ready for a comeback. >> reporter: actress hayden panettiere has been a fixture on the big screen and on your tv screen for decades. stealing our hearts as the

daughter in "remember the titans." >> what are you doing? it was a hold! oh, come on! ♪ >> reporter: and portraying troubled country singer juliette barnes in the hit drama "nashville." >> help me get my life back. >> reporter: hayden panettiere pushed her career to the brink of ruin, battling real-life demons for a lot of that time. >> i'd been struggling for a long time. and i just needed a break. four years ended up being the amount of time. and i definitely, absolutely, did not expect it would be that long. >> reporter: pat 32, she's read for a comeback after healing and recovery. he perusing her role as kirby reid in the hit blockbuster franchise of "scream." >> look out! >> filming now, set for theaters

next year. >> does kirby make it past the first kill? >> i don't think i can tell you. but i don't think anyone's going to be disappointd. >> the exciting new chapter is one she's fought for years to get to. after publicized struggles with alcohol and addiction, she's sharing her story in the latest issue of "people" magazine. >> i felt i was walking blind and there was nobody there that was really able to support me in the way that i needed to be supported. and i don't like to ask for help either. you know. i want to be that strong, stoic woman. but when you see a happy-go-lucky girl for years suddenly on the floor, in a puddle of mess and alcohol -- you've got to know something's wrong. >> reporter: hayden panettiere revealing she was first introduced to the substances that would lead her down a dark path in her teen years. >> when i was about 16, one of the people that i was working with in my inner circle introduced me for the first time

to what she called happy pills. and i had no idea what they were. but i know that when i was given one and i was sent down the red carpet i was lively, totally down to answer the questions, a chatterbox. >> what did you come to learn those happy pills were? >> i think they were a form of adderall. i was completely unknowledgeable about drugs and that kind of thing. i did grow up around people that i felt like -- i didn't realize till later, but i felt like used alcohol as medicine. >> how long did you find yourself self-medicating with alcohol? >> it was often on, but it wasn't i would say until after i had my daughter that i really realized that something was very wrong. and as you know, i went through postpartum depression. >> reporter: the star was overcome with postpartum depression after the birth of

her daughter in 2014. she says the loneliness she felt at that time fueled her alcohol dependency. >> i didn't have any negative feelings towards my child, i just knew i was deeply depressed. and i didn't know where the alcoholism was ending and the postpartum was beginning. and i ran myself pretty ragged. >> so where did you turn to for support? >> the bottle. the bottom of a bottle. it's not like people were pulling me aside and going, hey, you might want to go to a doctor and check on this depression stuff, because usually alcohol and drugs can be a symptom of what you're going through. >> what do you think are the biggest misunderstandingings about postpartum depression? >> the biggest misunderstanding that i found was that there were a lot of people who didn't believe it. they just thought i was being crazy woman, an overly emotional female, and that it was my choice whether or not to be depressed.

and it was so out of my control. >> what did it take to get you to this place that you are today? >> it took going to treatment, making a lot of great friends in treatment who can speak on your same level, where you don't feel like you're crazy. >> how are you today? >> i'm good. it's an everyday battle. it really is. i'm grateful to say that i'm sober today. >> reporter: seasoner and connecting on a whole new level with her 7-year-old daughter, kaia. i can only imagine one of the things you're most grateful for is your beautiful little girl. >> that she is. oh, she's my favorite little person. she reminds me of what i used to be as a little kid. but she's like the 2.0 version. she's so much smarter. watching how she has handled this whole ukrainian situation is -- has really blown my mind. >> reporter: her daughter with

former boxing legend wladimir klitschko calls ukraine home. for safety reasons she's not revealing where her daughter is living at this time. you're confident she's safe? >> she's very safe. where she is, she has a lot of friends. >> reporter: with klitschko and his brother, the mayor of kyiv, on the front lines of the war, hayden rushed to be at her daughter's side. >> i sat her down, tried to be casual enough about it. and i said, "sweetie, do you know what's going on in ukraine right now?" and she said, "yeah, i heard something about war." i said, you know, "uncle vitalia and your dad are being heroes. they're over there and they're trying to defend your country." >> you took action? >> i took action. i created hoplon international to make sure that every dollar people donate goes to med kits, protective gear, helmets, and blood for the people who are on the front lines. >> reporter: klitschko sharing this video from ukraine.

>> thank you for the med kits and the bullet-proof vests. they're going to save our lives. >> they are some of the strongest people i've ever met in my life.pso i'm praying, of ends. >> reporter: after years of darkness, hayden panettiere says she's ready to step into the spotlight once again with a renewed sense of purpose. where are you putting your energy moving forward? >> well, of course to making sure my daughter's okay. of course to helping ukraine. but also, i feel like i'm getting back in business. >> i'm sorry, it's just me. i tried to call 911, the land line's dead, someone smashed the router. >> now i'm getting back to work, and that is so good for the soul. i just want to keep that ball rolling. i have a whole new team of people around me who are incredible people, who really believe in me. and they've helped me to gain some trust back in myself. >> or thanks to kaylee. for more on hayden's story and her journey, pick up the new

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♪ finally tonight, there are minions among us. #gentleminions, that is. "the rise of gru," the fifth installment of the "despicable me" franchise, shattered box office records over fourth of july weekend. thanks in part to a tiktok trend featuring well-dressed teens posting their moviegoing joy, often complete with audience hoot going hollering. of course, it is a family film and some theaters are cracking

down on what they call bad behavior. but this much is clear, fans are going bananas for this summer blockbuster. and that's "nightline." you can watch all our full episodes on hulu. we'll see you right back here same time tomorrow. thanks for staying up with us. good night, america.