Well, these are the times we live in: we have to pause for a moment to be thankful that nobody was killed in this latest instance of police violence.
Still, that’s small comfort in this appalling incident. Staff at a group home for teenagers in Tucson, Arizona, called 911 after one young person knocked over a trash can and began yelling. I’m still trying to figure out why staff couldn’t handle the situation themselves: the boy in question is a quadruple amputee, which I think would dramatically limit his ability to endanger anyone.
Anyway, when sheriff’s deputies arrived, one of them apparently thought that a 15-year old without arms or legs posed such an imminent threat that he needed to be bodily assaulted and pinned to the floor. Then, to ensure that the quadruple amputee would “respect his authoritah” he proceeded to yell and scream in his face, because of course that’s what anyone would normally do with a severely disabled person who didn’t obsequiously comply with one’s every wish, right?
Of course, this scene wouldn’t be complete without some gratuitous power-tripping against bystanders as well. Apparently, Tucson deputies are under the assumption that they have the final word on the law and the Constitution so they can ignore court rulings upholding the right of citizens to film police activities. That explains why they handcuffed another teen who was filming the incident, without interfering, and gratuitously slammed his head against the wall after he was already cuffed … and then arrested both boys for disorderly conduct.
My guess is that racism was a part of this, as the boy is black. But, it’s just a guess at this point. Has the deputy assaulted others, not black, in the past? Is his rage and contempt set off more by the boy’s disability than his skin color? Does he just loathe troubled teens and see them as threats? Or at the bottom of it all is it basic racism? Hopefully his motivations will become clear as this is investigated.
This happened a couple of months ago but video of the incident has just surfaced. State prosecutors have dropped charges against both of the boys at the urging of the public defender’s office.
The sheriff’s department has opened an internal investigation and local media is likely to keep worrying them about it with the focused intent of a dog gnawing on a particularly juicy bone — it’s an awful story which also means it’s a great story for journalists to keep front and center until there is some resolution.
Let’s hope that resolution is swift and commensurate. Deputy Wannabe-Rambo should lose his job and lose any protection against a civil suit for abuse under color of authority, at the least. Both of the boys should get a big settlement from the county, as well.
I’m not holding my breath. Are you?
Sources
Arizona officer caught on video pinning quadruple amputee, 15, to ground at The Guardian
Disturbing video shows an Arizona sheriff’s deputy body slam a quadruple amputee at Vox