NY attorney general to form grand jury after Prude death in Rochester
ROCHESTER,
N.Y. (AP) — New York’s attorney general on Saturday moved to form a
grand jury to investigate the death of Daniel Prude, a Black man who
died after being hooded and held down by Rochester police earlier this
year.
“The Prude family and the Rochester community have been
through great pain and anguish,” Attorney General Letitia James said in a
statement about Prude’s death, which has sparked nightly protests and
calls for reform. She said the grand jury would be part of an
“exhaustive investigation.”
Prude’s death after his brother called
for help for his erratic behavior in March has roiled New York’s
third-largest city since video of the encounter was made public earlier
this week, with protesters demanding more accountability for how it
happened and legislation to change how authorities respond to mental
health emergencies.
“This is just the beginning,” Ashley Gantt, a
protest organizer, said by email after James’ announcement. “We will not
be stopped in our quest for truth and justice. It is always necessary
to do what’s right.”
Another protest was planned for Saturday on the street where Prude was detained.
Advocates
for legislation say Prude’s death and the actions of seven
now-suspended Rochester police officers — including one who covered the
Black man’s head with a “spit hood” during the March encounter —
demonstrate how police are ill-equipped to deal with people suffering
mental problems.
Having police respond can be a “recipe for disaster,” The National Alliance on Mental Illness said in a statement Friday.
Prude’s
death “is yet another harrowing tragedy, but a story not unfamiliar to
us,” the advocacy group said. “People in crisis deserve help, not
handcuffs.”
Stanley Martin, an organizer of Free the People
Rochester, told reporters: “We do not need violent workers with guns to
respond to mental health crises.”
Activists have marched nightly
in the city of 210,000 on Lake Ontario since police body camera videos
of the encounter with Prude were released by his family Wednesday.
Friday
night’s protest resulted in 11 arrests, police said. As they had the
night before, officers doused activists at police headquarters with a
chemical spray to drive them from barricades around the building.
As
the night wore on, demonstrators were pushed further back, as police
fired what appeared to be pepper balls. Fireworks were shot off and a
bus stop was set on fire.
Prude’s family has said he appeared to
be spiraling into crisis in the hours before police handcuffed him on a
street and pinned the naked man face down. In the video, police are also
seen covering his head with the white “spit hood,” designed to protect
police from bodily fluids.
“You’re trying to kill me!” the
41-year-old man is heard saying. He died days later in what the medical
examiner ruled was a homicide.
A police union has defended the
officers involved in the encounter, saying they were strictly following
department training and protocols, including using the mesh hood.