Magdiel Sanchez sat on his porch, as he had frequently, with a pipe. He had used it most of his life to gesture, to help convey his meaning. To draw. To point. As a deaf man with limited resources as a child, it became part of his voice. When police officers arrived on the scene investigating a nearby hit and run accident, neighbors sensed trouble when Sanchez walked to officers, carrying the kind of pipe he had used most of his life — as long as many had known him. And then the unthinkable happened.
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Julio Rayos, a neighbor who lives a few homes away and knew the man was deaf, said he saw the confrontation unfold and sensed trouble.
He said that he ran toward the officer with his wife and his 12-year-old daughter, all three of them screaming that the man could not understand the officer.
“Don’t kill him, he’s deaf,” his daughter yelled. “Don’t do it!”
About six other neighbors joined in, frantically trying to get the officer’s attention. But less than a minute after the episode began, a second officer arrived and immediately pulled out his handgun, Mr. Rayos said. While people continued to scream, the first officer fired his Taser at Mr. Sanchez, while the second fired his handgun, the police said.
At the end of the evening, Mr. Sanchez was dead. His biggest crime? Being deaf. Roughly ½ of all Americans who are killed during police interactions are persons with disabilities.
Police handling of disabilities has come under fire frequently over the last few years, with concerns that officers too often take a shoot first position of risk when dealing with individuals with mental or physical disability.
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In the police recording, which came from the officers’ dashcam video systems, one officer implied that he is familiar with the home, saying, “Is this the one with the three kids?” The officers also briefly mentioned possible mental health issues.
The audio suggests that police fired their weapons very soon after first encountering Lyles. One officer asked about an Xbox being taken and whether the door had been unlocked before the police start shouting at the woman to get back. About 15 seconds after that first command, officers started firing.
In reports provided to NBC, the killing of disabled Americans, and especially disabled Americans of color, continues in part because of a lack of training and understanding of how to deal with the issue. 15 seconds is not normally time for a person without disabilities to react and process a situation; but for those with disabilities, it is way, way too fast.
It takes very little research to find cases of disabled members of our society killed in police interaction, often due to not understanding their issues. Some are truly heartbreaking.
www.nbcnews.com/...
The report also cites the tragic example of Ethan Saylor, a 26-year-old with Down syndrome who was simply trying to spend a day at the movies when he was killed in 2013.
Saylor had purchased a ticket to see “Zero Dark Thirty,” but when he tried to stay in the theater for a second showing of the movie, he got into an altercation with the theater’s security.
Saylor was unarmed, and three off-duty Frederick County deputies, working as security guards, restrained and dragged him from the theater until he died of asphyxiation.
Saylor could be heard screaming “mommy, mommy,” “it hurts,” according to a lawsuit filed by his family. Authorities ruled the death a homicide. A Maryland grand jury declined, however, to indict the officers.
A seven dollar movie ticket cost a young disabled man his life. The use of a pipe as a pointing stick cost Magdiel Sanchez his life.
For those of us who love individuals with disabilities, it is a reminder we can’t just say we want to do better, we have to actually do better. Immediately. A young 12 year old girl begged for the life of her neighbor. And this morning, she knows despite her pleas to the parties who could hear her voice, they chose not to listen.