Deaths and Injuries in Police Custody

[Andrea]

My version of the correct headline: 13 year old child with a toy gun was shot running away from two plain clothes police in an unmarked car

Baltimore police investigate officer's shooting of teen who had replica gun

http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/28/us/baltimore-13-year-old-shot/index.html

A Baltimore police officer shot and wounded a 13-year-old boy who was carrying a replica handgun.

The teen, who police say is expected to recover, was shot at the end of a foot chase Wednesday after officers spotted him walking down the street. They pursued the boy thinking he had a real gun, Baltimore Police Commissioner Kevin Davis told reporters.

It turned out to be a pellet gun, Davis said.

But he said, "It's a dead-on ringer for a Beretta 92FS semiautomatic pistol."
The officers who chased the teenager -- detectives assigned to the department's intelligence unit -- identified themselves before shooting him, Davis said.

He said he did not know why the teenager had the pellet gun or why he ran. He said officers had interviewed the teen's mother and that she knew he had left the house with it.

He defended the officers' actions, saying officers couldn't have known the gun was a replica, but even then, replica guns have been used in crimes before. Officers, he said, had no idea what the teen's intentions were.
"We can't allow someone to walk down the street in broad daylight anywhere in Baltimore with what looks like to be a semiautomatic pistol in his hand," Davis told reporters.

The shooting came on the first anniversary of violent protests over the death of Freddie Gray while in Baltimore police custody.

It also occurred two days after the city of Cleveland agreed to pay $6 million to the family of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who died in 2014 after police shot him while he was in possession of a replica handgun.

While police spokesman Detective Donny Moses said Baltimore was quiet overnight and into Thursday, reaction was mixed on social media.

"We have more questions than answers today," Baltimore civil rights activist DeRay Mckesson said on Twitter. "Why did the Baltimore officers approach the 13 year old child? Why did they shoot him?"

One Twitter user told Baltimore police, "Awesome job! I hope you arrest his mother for negligence or contributing to delinquency. She's unfit."

But on Facebook, Darren Willis said in a reply to the police update on the incident that "cop kissing jerks" praising the department had missed the point.

"How was he to even know they were cops? He was 13 and ran away from grown-assed men who were strangers and armed. Details matter. I know, blame the target and the mom. It's easy for racists and idiots."

[Andrea]

Florida officer fired for hitting handcuffed woman, authorities say

http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/29/us/jacksonville-rookie-officer-fired/index.html

A Florida police officer has been charged with battery and fired for repeatedly striking a handcuffed woman in custody, authorities said.
Officer Akinyemi Borisade, 26, has worked with the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office for a year, Undersheriff Pat Ivey said.

The incident started Wednesday after Borisade arrested a woman at a local bar for trespassing and resisting arrest.

Police responded to the scene after the woman, a new employee at the bar, got into an argument with her employer and was asked to leave.

When police arrived to escort her out of the property, she became belligerent, authorities said.

She refused to be handcuffed and tried to kick and bite the officers, CNN affiliate WJXT reported. It said while she was in the patrol car, she continued kicking and had to be restrained.

Officers transported her to Duval County Jail.

Multiple strikes

In a video released by the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office, she's seen kicking Borisade, who was one of the arresting officers. He responds with multiple strikes to her midsection.

Corrections officers who saw the incident talked to their supervisors about it, according to the affiliate.

"There are ways this could have been dealt with without striking her," Ivey said at a news conference. "There was no need to strike her."

The woman has been released and has no pending court date, authorities said.

Battery charges

Borisade was charged with battery and terminated by the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office on Thursday. Since he's been on the job since March last year, he is within the 18-month probationary period mandated by his employer.

As a probationary officer, he cannot appeal his firing and will not be afforded civil service protections following his termination, according to Ivey.

CNN's attempts to reach an attorney for him have been unsuccessful.

[Andrea]

Video footage outside Jamycheal Mitchell's cell no longer exists

http://www.richmond.com/news/article_b6c51cce-7d99-555e-86df-bab012b52162.html



Video images captured outside Jamycheal Mitchell’s cell at Hampton Roads Regional Jail in the days and hours leading up to his death no longer exist, even though an attorney representing the mentally ill man’s family says he asked the jail’s superintendent to preserve it.

The only people who saw the video before it was recorded over are employees of the jail, said Lt. Col. Eugene Taylor III, an assistant superintendent at the jail.

Taylor said the video was not saved because it did not show any type of criminality or negligence, but the attorney representing Mitchell’s family said the jail should not have the authority to make that judgment call on its own.

“You have a death of a severely emaciated person who was mentally ill in his cell,” said Mark Krudys, an attorney representing Mitchell’s family. “Those circumstances are highly unusual, and you would have thought they would have preserved anything and everything related to those circumstances, including the videotape.”

Mitchell, a 24-year-old Portsmouth resident, was confined at the jail for 101 days last year after he allegedly stole $5 worth of snack food from a convenience store.

He died in August awaiting transfer to Eastern State Hospital in Williamsburg, where a judge had ordered him to be placed after finding Mitchell incompetent to stand trial.

Mitchell weighed 190 pounds when he arrived at the jail on May 11 and weighed 144 pounds during the autopsy performed after he died Aug. 19, Taylor has said.

The Medical Examiner’s Office in Norfolk said he died because of a heart defect and “wasting syndrome,” or extreme weight loss.

Jail officials have declined to release the results of an internal investigation, which Taylor has said clears jail employees of wrongdoing.

In an interview earlier this month, Taylor told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that video images outside Mitchell’s cell showed him receiving food through a slot in the heavy steel door.

The cell had concrete walls and only a small window in the door. The cameras did not show whether Mitchell actually ate his food, Taylor said.

“There was no indication that Mr. Mitchell was not eating,” Taylor said. “If the officers had any indication that he was not eating his food, he would be placed on what is determined to be suicide watch or hunger strike.”

***

The Times-Dispatch requested a copy of the video outside his cell through a Freedom of Information Act request, but the request was denied because the video does not exist.

“There is no security footage taken outside of Mr. Mitchell’s cell during his incarceration at Hampton Roads Regional Jail,” Superintendent David L. Simons wrote in a response to The Times-Dispatch’s request.

When asked to clarify whether or not such video existed, Taylor said the video taken at the time Mitchell was incarcerated was part of an old system that automatically recorded over existing video every 18 days.

Fourteen days after Mitchell died, Krudys said his office hand-delivered a letter addressed to Simons that requested the jail preserve “all records, documents ... videos and other electronic/digital media, and all other tangible things concerning Mr. Mitchell.”

Krudys provided a copy of the Sept. 2 letter last week to The Times-Dispatch after he was told the video no longer existed.

He said the jail was obligated to have kept, at the very least, the last four days of Mitchell’s life — a critical time period that would have shown what kind of medical care he received in his cell — because his firm delivered its request to preserve records 14 days into the 18-day loop.

Jeff Rosen, an attorney with Virginia Beach-based Pender & Coward who is representing the jail, said he could not comment on Mitchell’s case because Krudys has said he intends to file a lawsuit on behalf of the family.

When asked why the video was not saved even after Krudys requested that officials keep it, Taylor said it had been recorded over because the jail did not have any reason to keep it.

“If there’s nothing on the video that’s going to show any type of criminality or negligence, we’re not going to maintain it,” Taylor said.

“We only save video whenever there’s something significant we need to review.”

Asked if an inmate’s death qualified as a significant event, he said: “For example, if an individual is in their cell and something occurs and we look at the video, and the cell door doesn’t open, no one goes in, no one goes out, and there’s no negligence, there’s no reason for us to maintain that.”

Mitchell, who often soiled his cell with his own feces, was supposed to be checked at least 49 times a day — every 30 minutes by guards and at least once a day by medical staff. The cameras presumably would have recorded how often he was seen by guards and how often his quarters were cleaned, Krudys said.

“Were medical rounds being undertaken?” he said. “Were any medical staff going in to see him to take vital signs? Were social workers going in to see him? All of those types of things. How is he being treated?”

The Mitchell video was viewed by Taylor and the jail’s internal investigators but was not seen by outside agencies such as the Office of State Inspector General, the Virginia Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services, or Portsmouth police, all of which conducted inquiries into Mitchell’s death.

It’s not clear from the reports issued by the inspector general’s office or the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services whether investigators with those agencies attempted to view the jail’s video taken outside Mitchell’s cell.

It’s inappropriate that the jail made the final determination about whether the video contained information of significance, Krudys said. The cameras presumably would have been able to capture how often Mitchell was offered food, how much food typically was on his trays, and whether the trays came back empty.

Taylor said he saw Mitchell receiving food through a slot in the door on the videos, and he saw empty trays returned. It’s unclear whether Mitchell flushed his food down the toilet or otherwise disposed of it in his cell.

Krudys does not take jail officials at their word that Mitchell was fed consistently, given his extreme weight loss.

***

Jamie Fellner, a senior adviser with Human Rights Watch who has written extensively about the treatment of mentally ill people in prisons and jails, said video is “hugely important” in death investigations.

“It is truly reprehensible that, in a case like this, it was allowed to be taped over,” Fellner said. “If policy permitted that, then the policy needs to be changed.

“Obviously when there is a death — even if in their judgment the recording showed nothing of interest — it should be preserved.”

Fellner had many of the same questions as Krudys: How often was Mitchell fed? Did medical staff assess him? If he wasn’t eating, why wasn’t he taken somewhere with adequate mental health care?

“Negligence and indifference can be as lethal as affirmative physical abuse,” Fellner said. “The staff doesn’t have to beat up someone to kill him; they can kill him by not paying attention to his needs.”

Video obtained by the CBS news program “60 Minutes,” which aired April 17, showed guards repeatedly checking on a man jailed at Rikers Island in New York City. Like Mitchell, Bradley Ballard was schizophrenic and soiled his cell with feces.

Ballard repeatedly flooded his toilet, and a maintenance worker cut off water to his cell, according to the “60 Minutes” report.

The stench grew so strong, guards could be seen in the video spraying air freshener outside his cell, and an inmate delivering food through a slot in the door covered his nose with his shirt.

Medical help wasn’t called until Ballard had been locked in the cell for six days. His quarters were “grossly unsanitary,” according to the report.

An officer asked Ballard if he could get up on his own. “I need help,” Ballard said.

He went into cardiac arrest and died hours later, according to the report.

His death was ruled a homicide by the city’s medical examiner, who called his medical and custodial care “so incompetent and inadequate as to shock the conscience.” No one has been charged with a crime.

In Virginia, Fairfax County Sheriff Stacey Kincaid released video footage last year of a six-member “extraction team” attempting to shackle 37-year-old inmate Natasha McKenna of Alexandria at the Fairfax jail.

As soon as the cell door opens and McKenna emerges naked, she can be heard saying, “You promised that you wouldn’t kill me. I didn’t do anything.”

The men, several of whom wore what appeared to be biohazard suits, wrestled her to the ground. They shocked her with a Taser four times after she was restrained.

McKenna stopped breathing and was taken to a hospital, where she died days later.

“Since Feb. 3 of this year, there have been numerous media reports about what allegedly occurred,” Kincaid said in a video introduction to the recording. “There is no better way for me to share what actually occurred than to make this video available for the community to view in its entirety.”

Her death was ruled an accident, but Kincaid banned the use of Tasers and changed the way the department handles mentally ill inmates.

In Virginia Beach, Sheriff Ken Stolle allowed the family of a 31-year-old woman who died in jail to review video taken from her cell in 2011, according to The Virginian-Pilot.

Last week, Stolle said there are more than 500 cameras in the Virginia Beach jail, and the system begins recording over old video every 30 days. But video that captures critical incidents that need to be investigated typically is kept for about three years.

Without seeing the video from outside Mitchell’s cell, Stolle said he could not say whether it contained pertinent information but, if it did, “the logical standard is to keep that evidence to be reviewed.”

[Andrea]

No Charges for Police in Virginia Man's Death After Repeated Tasings

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/no-charges-police-virginia-mans-death-after-repeated-tasings-n566386

Prosecutors have decided not to charge police officers in the death of Linwood Lambert, a Virginia man who died in police custody after repeated tasings in May 2013, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the investigation.

Virginia prosecutors briefed Lambert's family about the decision on Monday, two days before the third year anniversary of the incident in South Boston, Va.

"We waited three years to get back to the same place, where these officers are not going to be held accountable for their actions," said Gwendolyn Smalls, Lambert's sister, after leaving the meeting Monday evening.

According to another source with knowledge of the inquiry, the lead prosecutor, Halifax County Commonwealth's Attorney Tracy Quackenbush Martin, investigated whether the repeat tasings were the actual cause of Lambert's death — while another prosecutor, Michael Herring, Commonwealth's Attorney for the City of Richmond, focused on whether the officers had the criminal intent to harm or kill Lambert.

The prosecutors are expected to release a report of their findings on Tuesday.

Tom Sweeney, who represents Smalls in a civil suit against the police, said he "was disturbed to learn" that the prosecutors "reached out to a paid consultant for Taser International analyzing the decision on whether or not these officers acted within the law."

The three officers discharged their tasers 20 times during the incident, including while Lambert had his hands and feet bound — a violation of police rules.

The incident had been under investigation since it occurred in May 2013, and drew renewed scrutiny after video of the tasings were exposed by MSNBC in November 2015.

Police files files obtained by MSNBC also suggested police misled investigators about the incident.

Lawyers for the officers have denied any wrongdoing in the case.

Police initially took Lambert into custody not as a suspect, but to bring him to the ER for medical care after reports that he was acting erratically in a hotel room. He broke their squad car window when arriving at the hospital entrance, where police then tased him repeatedly, shackled his legs, and then removed him from the hospital and took him to jail, where he died.

In the civil suit regarding his death, his family is arguing police had an obligation to provide him the medical care they initially offered.

Sweeney says the suit is currently on appeal, focusing on a lower court's ruling "regarding the initial tasings" and whether the police violated the Constitution by depriving Lambert "of medical care."

Apart from the local investigation and the civil suit, the FBI also recently opened an inquiry into the incident.

Smalls, Lambert's sister, says that a separate inquiry is welcome because she does not think the local prosecutor was fair or impartial.

"It's unbelievable, her theory was more supportive to the police officers, because her husband is a sheriff and she works with the police," Smalls told NBC News.

That prosecutor, Martin, did not immediately return calls on Monday evening. She has previously said she would take a thorough and fair approach to the case and follow the facts where they lead.

[Andrea]

Michael Slager charged with federal civil rights violation, obstruction in Walter Scott shooting

http://www.postandcourier.com/20160511/160519884/michael-slager-charged-with-federal-civil-rights-violation-obstruction-in-walter-scott-shooting

A federal grand jury this week indicted former North Charleston officer Michael Slager on charges of a violating civil rights law and misleading investigators in Walter Scott’s death, a rare measure in police shootings that gives authorities another route to reach a conviction.

S.C. civil rights cases

Since 1993, nine public officials in South Carolina have been charged with deprivation of civil rights in six different federal cases. Sorted by the year they were filed, those are:

2016: North Charleston police officer Michael Slager indicted in the April 2015 shooting death of Walter Scott.

2010: Greenville officers Jeremiah Milliman and Matthew Jowers got three years of probation for assaulting homeless people, some of whom were handcuffed, for a laugh.

2009: S.C. Highway Patrol Lance Cpl. Alexander Richardson entered pretrial diversion and served 100 hours of community service for hitting and injuring a fleeing suspect with a patrol car in April 2009.

2000: David Grice, a polygraph examiner, was fined $250 for his role in secretly videotaping a conversation between a murder suspect and a defense attorney in May 1995. Civil rights charges against Assistant Solicitor Francis Humphries Jr. and Lexington County Deputy Scottie Frier in the same case were dismissed.

1995: Archie Lee got a year in prison for fondling women in the early 1990s during his time as an Horry County magistrate.

1993: Moses Cohen Jr. was sentenced to 15 months in prison for beating up men in the late 1980s while serving as police chief in Fairfax, a town in Allendale County.

Slager is charged with three crimes. The chief among them is deprivation of civil rights under the color of law, a statute barring abuses of power that violate federally protected “rights, privileges or immunities.” The indictment alleges that he was acting with his authority as a policeman when he used excessive force — a violation of the Constitution — by shooting Scott five times from behind.

He also was indicted on counts of using a firearm in a violent crime and obstruction of justice after he told state investigators that Scott was coming at him with his own Taser when he fired. A video showed Scott running away.

The officer is white and Scott was black, but race is not alleged to have played a role.

The charges could serve as a backstop if the state’s murder case against Slager, 34, were to fail. Putting him on trial in both state and federal courts for the same shooting would not be double jeopardy because the alleged crimes are different.

No minimum prison term would come with a conviction on the civil rights charge. Because Scott died, the maximum sentence is life behind bars. Execution is sought only under the rarest of circumstances that are not present in this case, experts said.

An arraignment of Slager is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Wednesday in U.S. District Court in downtown Charleston. Scott’s family plans to discuss the development after the proceeding.

His killing came during close scrutiny of law enforcement tactics and uses of force nationwide. Video of the death made it an especially poignant moment in that debate and prodded the U.S. Department of Justice to step in.

The grand jury, which first met nearly a month ago, handed down the indictment Tuesday. Officials kept it under wraps until making it public Wednesday. It makes the case one of the few high-profile American police killings in recent years to result in a federal criminal charge. In South Carolina, Slager is the ninth public official since 1993 to face the civil rights count, records show, but he is the only one of those accused in a shooting.

Such prosecutions are relatively rare in police shootings, said Seth Stoughton, a University of South Carolina law professor who studies policing. It reveals the government’s eagerness to weigh in on controversial police killings like Scott’s regardless of actions taken in state courts, he said.

“The feds may be prosecuting because they think it’s important to use this case to send a message,” Stoughton said, “and that message might not be sent if officer Slager were just prosecuted and even convicted on the state charges.”

Slager’s lawyer in state court, Andy Savage of Charleston, has said that such a development would have a significant negative impact on the defense. The attorney has maintained, though, that his client’s actions were justified.

It was not immediately clear who would represent the former officer on the federal charges. Savage said he is committed to defending Slager only in state court, where he has worked for free.

The indictment came more than a year since April 4, 2015, when Slager pulled over Scott’s Mercedes-Benz for a broken brake light. The patrolman acted professionally, his attorney said, as Scott, 50, couldn’t provide documents for the car.

As the officer checked with dispatchers on Scott’s identification, the motorist got out and ran. Slager gave chase and tried to use his Taser, but the stun gun had little effect.

A struggle followed. Slager’s attorney said later that the officer suffered a beating and that Scott grabbed the Taser.

Nearby, a bystander filmed the final moments of the scuffle with a cellphone. The video shows the stun gun fall, then Scott turn and start running again. Slager drew his .45-caliber pistol and fired eight times with Scott’s back turned to him. Scott fell.

After the gunfire, the officer is seen picking up the Taser and dropping it near Scott’s lifeless body. Seconds later, he plucked it from the ground and returned it to its holster.

Three days passed before he was arrested.

In state court, a grand jury indicted Slager on a murder charge that carries between 30 years and life in prison. He was freed on bail in January to prepare for a trial now set for Oct. 31.

Prosecutors from the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division and FBI agents, meanwhile, worked on building their own case.

The federal government in recent years has zeroed in on allegations of police misconduct and opened its own probes into controversial deaths of black men. The cases included the 2014 killings of Michael Brown in Missouri, Laquan McDonald in Chicago and Eric Garner in New York, along with Freddie Gray’s death last year in Baltimore.

In 2014, the FBI reported getting 72 criminal indictments for deprivation of civil rights, but none of them came in the high-profile deaths. Scott’s is the first of those cases to prompt the indictment.

The four-page indictment is signed by U.S. Attorney Bill Nettles, South Carolina’s chief federal prosecutor, and Principal Deputy Attorney General Vanita Gupta, who leads the Civil Rights Division in Washington. It revealed for the first time some details of Slager’s interview with State Law Enforcement Division agents in the hours before his arrest.

“Slager knowingly misled SLED investigators by falsely stating that he fired his weapon at Scott while Scott was coming forward at him with a Taser,” the document alleged. “In truth and in fact, as ... Slager then well knew, he repeatedly fired his weapon at Scott when Scott was running away from him.”

While the federal case could serve as a backup if Slager were acquitted in state court, experts said, the civil rights charge also carries a high burden of proof for prosecutors.

Legal concepts on self-defense give defendants leeway to use force against perceived threats. Appeals courts also have ruled that using deadly force on a fleeing felon who poses a threat to the community can be legally justified — a key component to Slager’s defense against the murder charge.

Authorities, though, have said that any danger Slager or the community faced had subsided by the time he opened fire. Representatives of Scott’s family also have called the defense, which highlights evidence of the victim’s alcohol and cocaine use, “smoke and mirrors.”

While state prosecutors must prove their murder case by showing that Slager acted with malice — an evil intent or disregard for life — their federal counterparts must show that he purposefully meant to deprive Scott of a right by using excessive or unreasonable force, said Stoughton, the law professor.

In both cases, intent is key.

Defendants can fight the civil rights charge by arguing that they made an error in good faith — a reasonable mistake in the heat of the moment — instead of a conscious decision to violate a personal right, Stoughton said. Simply playing a video that prosecutors say shows an over-the-top reaction might not be enough to persuade jurors to convict Slager, he said.

“Murder is not easy to prove either,” he said, “but willfully violating someone’s constitutional right in these circumstances is a difficult charge for prosecutors to prove, which is why we see it so rarely.”

[Andrea]

Televised Police Chase Ends With Officers Beating Suspect

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/televised-police-chase-ends-with-officers-beating-suspect_us_5733a8d8e4b077d4d6f20ee5?

Police officers beat a suspect on television following a car chase through Massachusetts and New Hampshire on Wednesday.

As news helicopters circled overhead, the driver of the pickup truck involved in the pursuit opened the driver’s door and crawled onto his hands and knees in Hudson, New Hampshire. About eight officers closed in on him, some with their guns drawn, and at least two officers struck the man. One of the officers pummeled the man with repeated blows.

It wasn’t immediately clear which police departments were involved in the arrest.

The chase began when a suspect wanted on multiple warrants refused to stop for police in Holden, Massachusetts, near the state line, according to WCVB. From there, the chase wound through Concord, Littleton, Chelmsford, Billerica, Nashua, Hudson and several other towns.

“Now they’re incorporating the arrest,” a WFXT newscaster said as officers pounced on the man and the ariel camera pulled back. The station’s broadcaster didn’t appear to address the violence as it unfolded.

CBS Boston, which carried the footage, also used euphemisms to describe the action.

“Here’s the video as they approach him, and they take care of him when he gets outside the cab of that truck,” the CBS broadcaster says.

Other news footage captured about 30 seconds from the time the driver steps out of the truck.

“No details on what precipitated this,” a reporter says as the suspect stands with arms handcuffed behind his back. “But it was with great force that they get that guy on the ground.”

[Andrea]

Disturbing Video Shows a Cop Brutally Beat a Child for Riding Her Bike, Charges HER with Assualt

http://thefreethoughtproject.com/cop-beats-young-girl-riding-bike-mall-parking-lot/

On May 24, 2014, 15-year-old Monique Tillman and her brother were riding their bikes when they were stopped and this young girl brutally assaulted by Tacoma Police Officer Jared Williams.

Tillman and her brother had done nothing wrong, and were merely targetted by this ‘public servant’ because they had the unfortunate luck to have crossed paths with him.

As the duo travelled home, they cut through a mall parking lot, as they had done countless times before. However, this time, Officer Williams was in that parking lot, in his full Tacoma Police department uniform, yet off-duty, working as mall security. As the teens travelled through the lot, Williams began pursuit of these hardened criminals and accused them of trespassing.

Knowing they’d done nothing wrong, Monique attempted to explain to the officer that they cut through the parking lot all the time on their way home. However, this tyrant was having nothing of it.

As the duo attempted to ride away from a man whose intentions were clearly unscrupulous, Williams attacked. A recently released surveillance video shows the disturbing scene that unfolded next.

This heroic officer ripped the girl from her bike and slammed her up against a parked car with his hand around her neck. As the child struggled to breathe, this abusive tyrant grabbed her by the hair and flung her around like a rag doll.

Clearly overpowering the small child, half his size, the officer wasn’t satisfied with the damage he’d inflicted so far. So, for good measure, Williams pulled out his taser and sent 50,000 volts into this poor girl.

“He was choking me, grabbed me by my hair and tried to slam my face into the concrete. The next thing I know, I’m on the ground being tased,” Tillman said.

Now face down, tasered, handcuffed and brutalized, Williams stood over his victim like a hunter and his kill. He had protected society from the likes of a dangerous brother and sister riding their bicycles.

Williams then arrested Monique and charged her with resisting arrest and, get this, assault on an officer.

After viewing the surveillance video of the incident, however, all of the charges were thrown out.

Vito de la Cruz, Tillman’s attorney, has filed a lawsuit seeking damages from Officer Williams, the Simon Property Group who owns the Tacoma Mall and Universal Protection Services, the private security company in charge of Tacoma Mall security.

“A child riding a bike should not have to worry that a police officer will stop her without legal cause and brutalize her,” said de la Cruz. “Our communities are weary of another African American child being hurt by unwarranted and excessive police force.”

The Free Thought Project reached out the Tacoma PD to inquire about Williams’ current status and if any disciplinary action had been taken. However, our requests for comment were not returned.

Below is what policing in modern day America has become.

[Cin]

Originally Posted by Andrea

[B]Mitchell, a 24-year-old Portsmouth resident, was confined at the jail for 101 days last year after he allegedly stole $5 worth of snack food from a convenience store.

He died in August awaiting transfer to Eastern State Hospital in Williamsburg, where a judge had ordered him to be placed after finding Mitchell incompetent to stand trial. ( he was suffering from schizophrenia)

Mitchell weighed 190 pounds when he arrived at the jail on May 11 and weighed 144 pounds during the autopsy performed after he died Aug. 19, Taylor has said.

In an interview earlier this month, Taylor told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that video images outside Mitchell’s cell showed him receiving food through a slot in the heavy steel door.

The cell had concrete walls and only a small window in the door. The cameras did not show whether Mitchell actually ate his food, Taylor said.

“There was no indication that Mr. Mitchell was not eating,” Taylor said. “If the officers had any indication that he was not eating his food, he would be placed on what is determined to be suicide watch or hunger strike.”

***

The Times-Dispatch requested a copy of the video outside his cell through a Freedom of Information Act request, but the request was denied because the video does not exist.

$5 worth of snack food? He is mentally ill and incompetent to stand trial. He was in a concrete cell with steel doors and a small window to slide food through. For taking 5$ worth of snack food. A mentally ill person. What is wrong with people? How can human beings do this? These are the people who are supposed to protect and serve. What has gone wrong? And why aren't we all up in arms? It is too exhausting I think. It wears you down.

[Andrea]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

$5 worth of snack food? He is mentally ill and incompetent to stand trial. He was in a concrete cell with steel doors and a small window to slide food through. For taking 5$ worth of snack food. A mentally ill person. What is wrong with people? How can human beings do this? These are the people who are supposed to protect and serve. What has gone wrong? And why aren't we all up in arms? It is too exhausting I think. It wears you down.

There is a group that are "up in arms". Campaign Zero is doing amazing things.

http://www.joincampaignzero.org/#vision

[Andrea]

Woman, 27, Shot And Killed By Police In San Francisco

http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2016/05/19/woman-27-shot-and-killed-by-police-in-san-francisco/

Authorities say a 27-year-old woman was shot and killed by San Francisco police Thursday morning in the Bayview district.

The woman was taken to San Francisco General Hospital, where she died. Her name was not released.

The shooting happened at Industrial Street and Shafter Avenue.

No officers were injured.

Police Chief Greg Suhr says the woman was driving a stolen car and refused officer’s commands to stop the car. Officers approached her on foot and she drove away. She was then shot by police.

Other details were not immediately available.

The shooting happened in the same neighborhood where Mario Woods was killed when an officer shot him on Dec. 2. That shooting enraged groups of activists and community leaders, prompting calls to fire Suhr.

[Andrea]

Exclusive: Inmate Died in Prison, Was Buried Before His Bronx Family Was Notified

http://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/criminal-justice/2016/05/19/ny1-exclusive--inmate-buried-upstate-without-bronx-family-being-notified.html

With tears rolling down his face, Lonnie Hamilton says he's living a nightmare. His namesake died in prison and was even buried without the family knowing it.

Hamilton: I want to know why my son is dead. I want to know why you buried him without asking me. I want to know why we weren't allowed to properly send him off.
Meminger: Where is your son's body?
Hamilton: I don't know.

Lonnie Hamilton, 22, was doing time at Marcy Correctional Facility, outside of Syracuse. He was convicted in the Bronx of robbery.

His family says they tried to reach him for several weeks and then decided to send him a letter. Looking for his prison's address on May 6, they went on the state's correctional website. They were shocked to see he was listed as deceased. He died on March 18.

"I'm thinking, 'This can't be right. It has to be some sort of typo or joke or whatever.' So we start reaching out to the facility" his father said. "Days later, they finally say he is deceased."

And he was already buried in a cemetery near the prison.

State Corrections tells NY1 it made several unsuccessful attempts to reach the inmate's next of kin, his father. They said the father's phone number didn't work.

Corrections say it also searched Hamilton's belongings for contacts but couldn't find any. They also reached out to police in Georgia, where Hamilton was originally from.

His father says he is easy to find because he's lived in the Bronx for many years and that's where his son was arrested.

"He was picked up, my doorstep. Knock on my door, 'Is your son here?' Taken out of my home," he said. "So they knew where I lived."

"They have nothing in writing at all to date that says their son is deceased. They have no autopsy report of how their son died. They don't know anything," said the Rev. Kevin McCall of the National Action Network.

The family says they were unofficially told their son committed suicide, but they find that hard to believe. They want his body exhumed and their own autopsy done. They are also calling for an independent investigation.

[Andrea]

Originally Posted by Andrea

Woman, 27, Shot And Killed By Police In San Francisco

http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2016/05/19/woman-27-shot-and-killed-by-police-in-san-francisco/

Woman killed by SF police sergeant IDd as Jessica Williams, 29

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Woman-killed-by-SF-police-sergeant-IDd-as-Jessica-7887427.php?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twit ter

The woman who was shot and killed by a San Francisco police sergeant Thursday morning after she allegedly attempted to flee officers in a suspected stolen car was identified Friday by the medical examiner as Jessica Williams, 29.

Williams, who the medical examiner said was from the Bay Area, died at San Francisco General Hospital.

Police said there was no immediate indication that the woman was armed or had been driving the car toward officers when she was shot.

Williams was shot one time, and despite the on-scene officers’ attempt to resuscitate her, she died Thursday at San Francisco General Hospital, the officials said.

Williams’ family has been notified of her death, the medical examiner said.

Thursday’s shooting was what many community members and city authorities called the last straw in excessive force from police, more specifically against people of color, igniting a chain of events that ended with Police Chief Greg Suhr’s forced resignation later in the day.

Mayor Ed Lee, who for weeks had brushed off calls from critics of Suhr to fire him, asked for the chief’s resignation during a lengthy meeting with him Thursday afternoon. Lee announced at a City Hall news conference about 5 p.m. Thursday that Suhr had tendered his resignation.

The officers involved in Thursday morning’s shooting, a Bayview station sergeant and another officer, have not been identified by police officials. They were working a special enforcement project that seeks to recover stolen vehicles.

The officers tried to apprehend Williams after spotting her in a parked, stolen car about 9:45 a.m. at Elmira Street near Interstate 280, Suhr told reporters Thursday at the scene. But a witness said she sped away, making it only 100 feet before crashing into a parked utility truck.

The white sedan Williams was driving became wedged beneath the truck, police said. Williams was trying to dislodge the vehicle, by shifting it forward and in reverse, and was not complying with police orders, Suhr said, when the sergeant fired one shot, striking her.

Police removed Wiliiams from the car and began cardiopulmonary resuscitation before paramedics arrived at the scene and took her to the hospital, Suhr said.

There was no immediate indication that she was armed, police at the scene said, but added that they planned to search the vehicle for weapons.

Police said the investigation into the shooting of Williams is still in its early stages.