Sources said the police department had held off on naming the officer to protect him.
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Rivera said the officer who shot “was trying to save the life of Mr. Kinsey and feels terrible that his aim missed and struck Mr. Kinsey”. In a cellphone video taken by a bystander and aired Wednesday on WSVN 7News, Kinsey can be seen lying on his back with his hands up, beside an autistic patient who escaped from a nearby facility.
The video doesn’t show what happened when the officer opened fire.
“It appeared to the officers that the white male was trying to do harm to Mr. Kinsey”, John Rivera, president of the Miami-Dade County Police Benevolent Association, told AOL.com.
The family of the autistic man has hired an attorney and is expected to speak out July 23. Moments later, Kinsey was shot by a North Miami officer on the scene. The state attorney’s office is also looking into the case, police said. When police arrived, they found the autistic man sitting on the ground cross-legged and playing with a toy truck.
Napoleon said Thursday that Kinsey was physically “doing OK”. Though it doesn’t show the shooting, Napoleon said he doesn’t believe it was edited before he received it.
Police responded to a 911 call about an armed man threatening suicide.
On Friday, Napoleon said he found the cop’s explanation implausible. The officer that shot Kinsey was placed on administrative leave, according to department policy.
“I took this job to save lives and help people”, according to the officer’s text statement.
“I did what I had to do in a split second to accomplish that and hate to hear others paint me as something I am not”.
“All he has is a toy truck in his hands”, Kinsey yelled in the video, referring to his patient. He asked his patient to be still and lie down.
“Please be still… get down… lay on your stomach”, Kinsey says in the video.
The man beside him rocks back and forth. Aledda claims to have been aiming at Kinsey’s autistic patient when he instead misfired and wounded the therapist.
“But I guess with all the shootings that are going on, they are nervous and shook up”, Matthews said. “Wow, was I wrong”.
Advocates for autistic people hope this week’s police shooting that involved an autistic man will lead to more training for officers so they can learn how to diffuse such situations. Kinsey also is black.
He filed a complaint with the North Miami Police Department. Five officers were killed in Dallas two weeks ago and three law enforcement officers were gunned down Sunday in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Prosecutors said they’ll decide whether the officer should be charged after the state agency completes its investigation. “At that time, we will conduct our own investigation and review all of the evidence to determine whether the actions of the shooting officer constitute a criminal act that can be proven beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt”. The New York Daily News reports that the second officer suspension is without pay and was given because the man provided conflicting statements regarding the controversial shooting.
U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch told reporters the Justice Department is aware of the shooting and working with local law enforcement to gather all of the facts and to decide how to proceed.
“But I have been highly trained”, she said.
“The PBA is now trying to say they meant to shoot my client, and they accidentally shot my employee”.
“We’re not accustomed to this tension that is evolving because of this shooting”, she said.
The shooting she said, isn’t typical of the city, which she described as a “melting pot”.
“This is not supposed to be happening in North Miami”.
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“An officer who betrays the trust of any residents of any community must be shamed, removed, fired and of course completely, completely lose the right to ever wear an officers’ uniform again”, North MIami city clerk Michael Etienne said. “So many of our police officers come from the community (and) live in the community”.
