United States police have been drawn into yet another controversy after officers in Delaware shot dead a man in a wheelchair.
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A 911 caller repeatedly tells a dispatcher that a man in a wheelchair who was shot and killed by police had a gun, according to a partial tape released late Friday by Wilmington Police.
A cellphone video shows one officer pointing a shotgun or a rifle at McDole, screaming “drop the gun” and “hands up”. His family has said the police could have used non-lethal force and that he was “shot like road-kill”. For a moment, the man in the wheelchair freezes, then falls sideways onto the ground.
While no gun is visible from the footage, police later said McDole was armed and that they had seized.38 calibre handgun from his body.
A state civil rights leader said the 48-year-old mom was left “devastated” after her son was shot multiple times by police while sitting in his wheelchair in broad daylight on a residential street Wednesday. It is hard to tell what McDole was doing throughout the video, although there does not appear to be a weapon in his hands.
“We don’t have anything to hide”, Williams said. The video footage showed McDole shuffling in his chair and moving his hands while officers ordered him several times to put his hands up.
“I assure you that not one of those officers meant to take anyone’s life that day”, Cummings said.
Eugene Smith, Mr McDole’s uncle, said he was with his nephew 15 minutes before the shooting. Additionally, Cummings said that McDole never complied with the officer’s directions. “That’s what it was”, he said. “I don’t care if he was black, white, whatever”, Smith added.
Yet Phyllis McDole – who spoke at the same news conference as Cummings, despite their obvious differences of opinion – doesn’t understand why her son died.
“The issue is the actions of police as clearly displayed on the video”, he said, referring to a phone video of the police confrontation shot by a bystander.
According to the Associated Press, the shooting occurred on September 24 in Wilmington, Delaware.
A bouquet of flowers was placed at the scene and some gray powder was on the concrete, apparently to soak up bloodstains. McDole had been paralyzed 10 years earlier from a gunshot would. The shooting came as police nationwide are still under scrutiny over the excessive use of force against African-American suspects.
“We need to take a serious look at policies and training, just like what New York had to go through”, he said.
“We want justice for my brother”, Ashley Morrison-Wright, 23, of Wilmington, said Thursday.
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“I had the opportunity to meet with relatives of Jeremy McDole yesterday, including his mother, grandmother and sister, during the vigil held in his honor and to offer my honest condolences for their loss”.
