Last week, a 30-year-old Juneau resident was killed in a police shooting. Raye Johnston grew up in Juneau, and was unhoused from a young age.
Johnston was identified as a woman in early reports of the shooting, but family and friends say they were genderfluid and used multiple pronouns.
A few days after Johnston’s death, their brother, Nathaniel Hensley-Williams, sat on the edge of a garden bed outside of the Glory Hall — an organization that provides shelter space for unhoused people in Juneau. He said he started getting condolence messages after the shooting, even before police confirmed Johnston’s identity.
“Everybody knew her,” Hensley-Williams said. “I mean, she’s been roaming the streets since she was 12, so it’s 18 years. So everybody knew her.”
His family is Lingít, from the Raven Moiety, and he pointed to the large black birds gathered across the street.
“The ravens have been upset, too,” he said.
But for him, the grief has been coming in waves.
“It hasn’t fully hit. Realization hasn’t fully set in,” he said.
Hensley-Williams said Johnston cared for the unhoused community in Juneau and would defend and support those who were having a hard time.
“She’s like me,” he said. “She never knew when to take off the cape and mask.”
Johnston’s mother, Angel Nierstheimer, agrees. She said Johnston was funny and good at making people smile.
“She was one that could uplift a lot of people, even sometimes in their darkest hour,” Nierstheimer said. “She was one for noticing that people might need a quick little chuckle.”
Hensley-Williams suggested Johnston might have known what the consequences could be when they advanced on armed police officers with a weapon on Christmas morning. Nierstheimer said Johnston had told friends they dreamed about being shot by police in the weeks leading up to the event.
According to Juneau police, officers responded to a call that Johnston was threatening people while holding a hatchet near the Mendenhall Valley Breeze In convenience store. They told Johnston to put down the weapon. When Johnston moved towards officers, police say they used a taser, but Johnston continued to advance. That’s when police say Officer Jonah Hennings-Booth opened fire and killed Johnston.
Juneau mental health advocate Christina Love met Johnston while she was doing crisis intervention work, and came to know them over the years. She saw them in moments of both hope and struggle. Love said she thought they wanted to get better.
“They were deeply interested in recovery and mental health and healing,” Love said.
Love is a specialist in advocacy for people who have experienced domestic violence, are involved with the justice system, or struggle with addiction. She also has personal experience with generational trauma among Indigenous people.
“People said, you know, this is a person that had caused a lot of harm, and there is no denying that, but I also know that it came from a place of so much need, like unmet needs, untreated medical, untreated mental health,” she said.
Johnston’s death was the second fatal police shooting in Juneau in 2024. In July, 35-year-old Steven Kissack was also shot and killed by police during an altercation downtown. Kissack had lived on the streets of Juneau for several years. After an investigation by the Alaska Bureau of Investigation, the state ruled that the use of force against Kissack was justified.
But members of the Juneau community, like Love, say these incidents raise questions about how people who live outside and struggle with mental health issues are treated in crises. She says more needs to be done to prevent mental health emergencies among Alaska Native people and the unhoused from ending this way.
“If we want changes, I think we have to ask different questions and have to demand evidence of that,” Love said. “So that means that we are asking for cultural responsiveness. We’re asking for them to be well-versed in trauma, well-versed in mental health and substance use.”
There is a script for what police do if a person threatens them with a weapon. But Love said that script considers the dangers of one moment and not the whole life of that person — or the lifetimes before.
“Because if they don’t know about the village that was burned here or why Native people — the majority of us — don’t own land, and why so many of us are struggling with substance use and mental health issues, then they’re going to think it’s an us problem, rather than it being like a systemic problem,” she said. “That bias and all of that is present when they’re holding a gun and there’s a Native woman-presenting mental health crisis in front of them.”
The Alaska Bureau of Investigation will investigate and the Office of Special Prosecutions will determine whether the shooting was legally justified. In accordance with JPD policy, the officers involved were placed on administrative leave following the shooting. On Thursday, JPD said the officers would all be back on duty by Friday.
Back at the Glory Hall garden, Hensley-Williams says he thinks Johnston is still looking out for their community.
“She’s still there, she’s still watching, she’s still there if needed, and will be until her mission is done,” he said.
A friend came outside and gave him a hug, and they watched the sunlight on the mountains together.
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