Black Man Dies Of Suffocation After Officers Put Hood Over His Head
Video of the police-involved incident that occurred back in March has been released to the public. It shows the horrific moment cops in Rochester, New York place a hood over an unarmed black man’s head while trying to detain him.
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The Hill reports that police detained Daniel Prude, 41, in mid-March after he ran naked through the streets. Records that were also released Wednesday revealed that cops placed the hood over his head and pressed his face into the pavement for two minutes. Apparently, it was a “spit hood,” intended to prevent them from coming in contact with a suspect’s saliva, on his head. However, in the video, Prude asked that they remove the hood but officers then slammed his head into the pavement while one held his head against the street with both hands. After he stopped moving, one officer says, “He feels pretty cold.” He died a week later, on March 30, after being taken off life support, The Associated Press reported.
“How did you see him and not directly say, ‘The man is defenseless, buck naked on the ground. He’s cuffed up already. Come on.’ How many more brothers gotta die for society to understand that this needs to stop?” Prude’s brother Joe Prude said Wednesday. The family for Prude and local activists are demanding the officers be fired and charged in his death.
The office of New York Attorney General (AG) Letitia James (D) began a probe into Prude’s death in April. One of the officers has claimed they hooded Prude because he had repeatedly spat in their direction and they were concerned about the coronavirus, The Hill notes.
“I want everyone to understand that at no point in time did we feel that this was something that we wanted not to disclose,” Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren (D) said at the press briefing. “We are precluded from getting involved in it until that agency [the AG’s office] has completed their investigation.”
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