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North Miami Police say they responded on July 20 to the area of Northeast 14th Avenue and Northeast 127th Street for a report of an armed man threatening suicide.
The "armed man" was a 23-year-old autistic patient who had wandered away from a nearby mental health center. He was sitting on the ground, playing with a toy truck.
47 year old behavioral therapist Charles Kinsey, a black man, was attending to the patient.
Multiple cops, armed with rifles, responded to the scene.
Kinsey was hit in the leg by one bullet. A photo shows Kinsey lying on his back with both hands in the air.
Speaking from his hospital bed Wednesday July 20 to a reporter for WSVN TV, Kinsey said "when it hit me I had my hands in the air, and I'm thinking I just got shot! And I'm saying, 'Sir, why did you shoot me?' and his words to me were, 'I don't know'."
The police administered no first aid. "They flipped me over, and I'm faced down in the ground, with cuffs on, waiting on the rescue squad to come", Kinsey said. "I'd say about 20, about 20 minutes it took the rescue squad to get there. And I was like, bleeding."
No gun was found at the scene.
At a Thursday July 21 press conference, the Miami-Dade Police Benevolent Association said the officer was a member of the SWAT team. The head of the PBA told reporters the officer was too far away to hear what Kinsey was saying before he fired.
Heavy.com Heavy.com with video
Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956:
A Florida police officer shot and wounded an autistic man's black caretaker, authorities said, in an incident purportedly captured on cellphone video that shows the caretaker lying down with his arms raised before being shot.
Source: LA Times
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday July 23 2016, @01:52AM
Again, I think the current news cycle is fanning the flames, but we've had cops shooting "innocent kids" more or less since cops got guns. We've had riots after cops are acquitted of manslaughter my whole life and then some, seems like every few years.
There are plenty of "community servant" programs, improving relations, etc. You may not remember the 1960s when "the pigs" were enforcers for things like the draft, Kent State, etc. Most cops have risen above that adversarial role.
With over 700,000 sworn officers on duty, it's a miracle there aren't "bad shoots" every week. It's like a soccer game with 300,000 attendees - by the odds, somebody's gonna die during the game, if it were a truly random cross sample, somebody out of 300,000 would die of old age within a few hours.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 23 2016, @03:22AM
It's a bit deeper than the occasional shooting.
You have primarily minorities detailing their encounters with police, and it ain't pretty. It may be a small sampling but it's there, and it's prevalent enough to establish a pattern. The shootings are just the most egregious manifestations.
While police have improved from the race riots in the 60s, were are almost to the point of having them again.