The father of Michael Brown Jr., the teen killed by a police officer in Missouri in 2014, spoke in Huntsville on Friday night at a screening of Ferguson Rises, a film that details the aftermath of the shooting.

Michael Brown Sr. said the film shines a light on the ongoing challenges of policing.

“Some people are not affected by it as we are as black people, so it explains what tragedy can do and when people will feel like so much has happened in the community,” he told AL.com. “Some feel like they need to leave the community because they don’t think it will rebuild; so it would explain to a lot of people that have just never been affected until this hit their streets.”

Brown Sr. and his wife, Calvina Mays, appeared at the screening just one day after police shot and killed a man in downtown Huntsville. The shooting death of 43-year-old Sterling Keyon Arnold loomed large at the event. Huntsville police shot Arnold on Thursday near the 500 Block of Monroe Street, about three miles from the screening venue. In a news release that did not identify the police involved in the shooting, the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency said Arnold “was in possession of a handgun.”

Speaking during a panel discussion before the screening, Brown Sr. reflected on what goes through his mind when he hears of someone dying at the hands of the police.

“Well, sadly, it’s still going on today,” Brown said. “Every time I hear about it, hear about the incidents of someone losing their loved one, their father, their son, their daughter, their mother, it replays in my head what happened in 2014. I feel for those families. And I understand the pain.”

Brown Jr.’s death sparked a national outcry against police violence, racism and harmful policing practices. The film screening occurred in the historic Lakeside United Methodist Church, as part of the three-day Huntsville Human Rights Film Festival.

Dr. Noelle Hunter, a political scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville and the festival’s coordinator, and Angela D. Curry, executive director of United Women of Color, both reflected on Arnold’s death.

Hunter said the program was essential to drive the community’s discussions on policing.

“It’s such an important conversation,” she said. “We know in our community last night that we are again confronted with policing and what needs to happen for us as a community to invoke humane policing in our community and, more importantly, continue to coalesce as an active social justice community for all so we don’t lose more people to gun violence, to police violence, so that we can all join in the theme of our Huntsville Human Rights Film Festival.”

After the screening, Curry told AL.com that Brown’s death in 2014 transformed her from a “Facebook keyboard warrior to actually becoming an activist.”

“And so the documentary means so much because it’s enlightening,” she said. “It shows how people can get involved. It shows how different ethnicities can work together for the same cause despite their background.”

During her speech before the screening, she called for a transparent investigation concerning the death of Arnold.

“I think it’s very important for us to acknowledge what is happening in our community, and for us that remain silent and don’t ask for transparent investigations from our local government, we’re always complicit in pulling the trigger along with officers,” she said. “So we hope that there will be a transparent investigation related to what happened yesterday.”

The program’s major sponsors include United Women of Color and the Humanities Center at UAH. Veteran media personality David Person moderated the panel discussion before the film screening.

The second annual Huntsville Human Rights Film Festival began on Thursday with the virtual screening of Angel of Alabama, a film exposing environmental contamination in Alabama, and ended on Saturday with film screenings and panel discussions on policing, mental health, food insecurity, and environmental health at UAH’s Morton Hall. The Friday event at Lakeside United Methodist Church featured Nashville Tennessee-based musician Chris Blue, the winner of The Voice season 12.

“With this film, I have traveled to California, New York, Australia, numerous places where people are interested in understanding that a lot of communities are hurting, and there are a lot of communities that stand up behind this and won’t sit down again after this,” Brown Sr. said.

He said he goes across the country to help grieving families under the auspices of the organization he founded after his son’s death: The Michael Brown Sr Chosen for Change Organization.

“Before Mike, I actually didn’t know about Eric Garner. I didn’t know about certain names,” he said. “But when Mike hit the TV, it’s like all these other people start flashing on the screen, too. So, I will say, him getting murdered opened the eyes of the world to broadcast and put these other families out there in the light so they can understand this is happening.”

“This is happening up in our eyes, and we don’t even know it,” he added. “If I wasn’t here busy with you guys, I probably won’t know what happened to the young man that got killed last night.”