Former IU football player remembered after fatally shot downtown
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — A former Indiana University football player was fatally shot as protests and rioting occurred in downtown Indianapolis over the weekend.
Christopher Beaty was shot in the area of North Talbot and east Vermont streets just before midnight Saturday.
After police officers arrived on the scene, they located the 38-year-old Beaty, who had been shot. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
On Monday, a memorial stands on the very spot where 38-year-old Christopher Beaty died Saturday night.
Brandon Mosley, an IU teammate who said he was Beaty’s best friend, told News 8, “My last real conversation with him was like at 10:45 that evening. Just talking about our plans and how we were going to just chill at home for the day.”
According to Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, police found Beaty suffering from gunshot wounds during the middle of the downtown riots.
Mosley said, “It shouldn’t have ever happened. We’ve got to do better out here, like, it sucks man. It hurts, this hurts.”
Mosley said Beaty recently created a mask company to help in the fight against COVID-19.
Mosley asked that anyone who saw anything or knows anything about this to call police.
IMPD did not respond to a News 8 request to see if any arrests have been made.
Beaty graduated from Cathedral High School in 2000, then went on to play IU football until 2004. People who knew him told News 8 he was an all-around great guy with a warm personality.
Chris Kaufman, the assistant commissioner of the Indiana High School Athletic Association, said, “Chris always smiled. He loved life. He loved life. He loved people, had a lot of friends. (He was) a community leader, a businessman. He was even a part-time DJ because at the Colts games every Sunday, I would see him. He was DJing music on the field for the Colts games.”
Indianapolis Colts producer/reporter Larra Overton met Beaty years ago when they were student-athletes at IU. “I am hurting for his family and I am sending them all of my prayers right now. It is incomprehensible.”
She said people naturally gravitated toward her friend Beaty and within minutes of meeting him, you had a friend.
“Just genuine. He was the type of person who when he asked, ‘How are you?’ it wasn’t just a surface ‘How are you?’ in passing. He genuinely wanted to know how you are.”
Which makes Beaty’s passing even harder for people who knew him.
Another friend, Chris Davis, told News 8 from Dallas, “He had an infectious personality. His smile was radiant. His heart was huge as all outdoors.”
A GoFundMe has been set up for the Chris Beaty Memorial Fund.
Statements
Following Beaty’s passing, IU head coach Tom Allen released the following statement:
“I am at a loss for words. The news of the passing of Chris Beaty is just devastating. Since I returned home to coach at Indiana, Chris embraced me, encouraged me and supported me! His passion for life and Indiana Football energized me every time we were together. He was one of our first alumni that displayed his unwavering support for what we are building here at Indiana and how we are building it. I am so heartbroken for his family and he will be deeply missed by all those that were blessed to call him a friend! LEO.”
Tom Allen, Indiana University head football coach
“The Indiana University Department of Intercollegiate Athletics stands with our students in our collective devastation and outrage over the senseless and inexcusable killing of George Floyd. Ever since I first saw the video of George Floyd’s murder, my heart has been hurting in a way I can’t remember it ever hurting, even though this is only the latest of too many examples of the awful consequence of racism so endemic in our society. Still, I know my pain is only a shadow of that being experienced by people of color because as a white person, I can never truly understand the depth of their pain. This was underscored to me by a comment one of our female African-American students shared with me last night: “Mr. Glass, this is personal because somebody died because he looked like me.” Our students are hurting. All of them. They are our family, and we love them. We are proud to be a Department that has always put the holistic care and support of our students first which is all the more important in tough times.
“We can’t let ourselves be content to send the Floyd family our “thoughts and prayers” and then lapse into moving on to other things, or we will be condemning ourselves to continuing to endure these kinds of atrocities, and George Floyd’s death will have been in vain. While almost any action seems insufficient given the overwhelming challenge that racism poses to all of us, that can’t deter us into inaction. We need to be the change we want to see in the world.
“As a start, last night, Athletic Director-Designate Scott Dolson, Senior Associate Athletic Director and Senior Woman Administrator Mattie White, and I had a Zoom meeting with the Athletic Director’s Council on Diversity and Inclusivity which I founded in 2016. The sharing by these students was very powerful and valuable and will continue to inform us as we move forward. The Council and I will co-host this week a Zoom meeting conversation for all interested student-athletes about their experiences and perspectives on George Floyd’s death, what it means to them, and how we should move forward as individuals and as part of IU Athletics. We will also host this week a similar conversation for our head coaches as well as one for all interested IU Athletics staff. The IU Athletics Office of Counseling and Sport Psychology will be reaching out to all of our coaches and students to make available mental health services tailored to address the trauma we know is being generated by George Floyd’s death and its aftermath.
“We also continue to stand ready to help our students find and express their voice on these and other important public matters. We respect and support the right of our students to engage in free speech and peaceful protests. Indiana University’s position on this is clear. The Indiana University Student Code of Conduct guarantees all IU students the right, among other things, to express thoughts and opinions on any subject without university interference or fear of university disciplinary action as well as the right to engage in peaceful and orderly protests and demonstrations.
“There are no easy or simple ways to fight racism or secure racial justice and equality, but that can’t be a reason not to try. I am confident that by sharing with each other and working together we can make a meaningful difference in IU Athletics and beyond.”
Fred Glass, Indiana University vice president and director of intercollegiate athletics
