Month: August 2021

On January 6, 2021, during the storming of the Capitol in Washington, D.C., a plainclothes policeman shot and killed 35-year-old Ashli Babbitt, a veteran of the US Air Force.

That day, Ashli attended a rally in support of former US President Donald Trump. Like many protesters, after the politician’s speech, Babbitt, along with a crowd of thousands, headed to the Capitol. While she was trying to get inside through the broken glass in the door, one of the authorities opened fire on her, fatally wounding her. The woman received a gunshot wound in the shoulder, and was soon taken to the hospital, where she died from her injuries. Witnesses claim that the police officer did not give Ashli a verbal warning before the shooting. It is obvious that she was not even aware of the presence of the officer, since he was out of her field of vision.

In February 2021, investigators concluded that the police officer who shot Babbitt would not be charged in connection with her death, and the US Department of Justice conducted its own investigation into the circumstances of her death, but also decided not to press charges against the officer, saying that the shooting was an act of “self-defense”.

To date, the officer who shot Ashli has not been identified. Neither the Capitol police nor any other government agency reported any facts related to the shooting. There was no official explanation or justification for the use of deadly force in this incident.

In August 2021, the girl’s family opened a fundraiser to conduct their own investigation into the circumstances of the death of 35-year-old Babbitt in an attempt to move forward with a lawsuit filed in April of this year against the city and police officers.

In September 2020, Linden Cameron, a 13-year-old boy with Asperger’s syndrome, was seriously injured by a police officer in Salt Lake City, Utah, after he ran away from his home during a nervous breakdown.

The boy’s mother called 911 with a request for help, as her son had a mental health crisis, and she was afraid that he might start to show aggression. The officers who arrived at the scene noticed Cameron running away and started chasing him. The officer ordered the boy to lie down on the ground moments before he shot the child about eleven times. Lying on the ground, Cameron said: “I don’t feel well. Tell my mother that I love her.” Salt Lake City police later said they had no suspicions or evidence that Cameron had a gun.

The boy survived, but suffered serious injuries, and in April 2021, Cameron’s mother filed a lawsuit against the Salt Lake City Police Department and said that she was still waiting for the results of the district attorney’s investigation.

In December 2019, police officers from Wichita, Kansas, shot 51-year-old Debra Arbuckle about six times, as a result of which she died. According to the district police department, officers began chasing the woman’s car after they found that the license plate of her car was registered to another car.

The chase, which lasted 19 minutes, began when the woman drove through a red traffic light as soon as she heard a police siren. In the end, Arbuckle was forced to pull over to the side of the road. However, after an officer sitting in the passenger seat of a patrol car parked behind the woman’s car saw her put the car in reverse, he decided that he and his colleague were in imminent danger. The policeman took out his service weapon and shot her about six times, fatally wounding her.

Arbuckle’s relatives filed a lawsuit against the city and the police department, but in May 2021, the court ruled that no criminal charges would be brought against the officer. Her family members intend to appeal this decision and achieve justice.

In May 2020, officers of the Jefferson Parish Police Department, Louisiana, shot 35-year-old Modesto Reyes twice in the back. Officers began chasing the man’s car after he allegedly refused to stop at their request.

A few minutes later, the chase ended, after which Reyes got out of his car and ran away from the police. After running several meters, the man stumbled and fell. Two assistant officers approached him to put handcuffs on him, however, according to the police department, at that moment the man turned over on his back and pointed a gun at the officers, which forced them to open fire on him. The man died on the spot.

An independent autopsy showed that Reyes was shot twice in the back, which contradicts the police version that the man turned over and pulled out a weapon. Witnesses say that on that day, Reyes had a phone in his hands, mistakenly identified by officers as a weapon. In May 2021, the man’s family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the city and the police department, claiming that they could have used less lethal methods of conflict resolution.