Three of Michael Jones' eight children, alongside their attorney, wanted to show everyone the man the knew: a loving father and grandfather.
"He was a jokester," daughter Tiara Chavis laughed. "And a rapper."
"That makes it even worse," another daughter, Mikeisha Kemp, lamented, "because he was en route to do the right thing and he lost his life."
Jones' family says he was returning a past-due U-Haul rental, which had been reported stolen, when Akron police approached at a gas station.
"What's going on?" Jones could be seen asking in police body camera video from the incident. Officers don't answer the question.
"You're under arrest," one says. "Get out of the car."
"For what?" Jones asked.
From, here, things escalated in 13 seconds, and ended with two deadly police gunshots.
"It started from a question to aggression," Chavis says.
"He was never defensive to me," Kemp added of viewing the video, "but for some reason, they jumped into action when he asked, like, 'Why?'"
"He was just treated like (an) animal," Chavis continued. "I don't know. I can't really describe it, but it wasn't human."
After Jones was shot, authorities claim officers found a loaded handgun on or near him, which the officers also mentioned in the bodycam video. However, family attorney Bobby DiCello believes police never saw the weapon before taking action.
"They never engaged him with the knowledge of a gun," DiCello asserted, "and there's no evidence in that video, no threats."
Jones' loved ones are hoping that, from their heartbreak, comes change. DiCello hopes so too.
"What if the officers were patient? What if the officers had actually authorized and collaborated with others on scene?" he wondered. "This would put in proper context what the society and what this family needs, which is law enforcement they can believe in."
Change may also come from within Jones' own family. Prior to the shooting, his son Darnell was on a path to becoming a police officer himself. Even after his own father was killed by law enforcement, Darnell's dream remains undeterred.
Until there's change, the family has a simple ask.
"I would want the world to know, just to make it personal for (themselves) and to just ride the wave with us," Cavis said. "And just for a moment, just sit in it and see how you would feel, and it would change your perspective on him being the bad person in the situation.
In short, empathy.