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Tanisha Anderson Case Brings Mental Health Training To Ohio Police
Saturday I was invited to ACLU of Ohio headquarters to discuss Mental Health Training for Ohio Officers following the recommendations by the Department of Justice’s consent decree. These recommendations stem largely from Tanisha Anderson’s case. She was murdered by Cleveland police on November 13th of 2014. It was a week before Tamir Rice was shot at Cudell Rec Center. When Tamir was shot, the focus was taken from the Anderson case.
Tanisha’s sister Jasmine has taken up the fight against police brutality on behalf of her sister. I met Jasmine last year at a protest for Tanisha that saw a crowd of angry Clevelanders take to the streets of the east side to demand justice. She was not quite ready to be on camera and do interviews and such, but she has recently contacted me about coming on the CopBlock Radio Show on Wednesday so she could tell her story. I am honored that in her decision to break her silence, she chose CopBlock Radio to do it.
The Cleveland police unions are making sure the thin blue gang reigns supreme. They claim that the officers that responded to the “welfare check” of Tanisha Anderson, acted “as they were trained.” See, Tanisha had committed no crime. The police were summoned to her house by her family because she was having a bad day, mentally. She was volunteering to go for a psychiatric evaluation. At some point she withdrew her consent, and the police killed her as a result of her resistance. But she was voluntarily going with them, so at what point did it not become voluntary? At what point did training say to “escalate the situation to include deadly force?”
The ACLU of Ohio director is quick to laud similar mental health training in Cincinnati, but as we saw last week, Cincinnati police tased an innocent protester and arrested several journalists for filming. The incident was caught on CopBlock cameras held by Ademo Freeman and Brian Sumner. In one breath he is praising the success of the Cincinnati program and in the next breath, a story of a man killed by police after a collaboration agreement was supposed to set things right. The police are never going to abide by any agreement until the are made to treat people with the respect they demand at every traffic stop. They want compliance at any cost, including your life. You have to learn to crawl before you can walk.
The resulting training is the best thing to come out of this case to date as the officers responsible for Tanisha’s death have never been held accountable for her death. No charges filed, nothing. Even though The Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner has ruled her death a homicide, they are quick to make sure it is clear this finding does not mean the police are guilty of anything. I think with the Department of Justice report being public knowledge and the findings revealing a “pattern of excessive force” by the Cleveland police, the officers are at the very least suspect, if not negligent in Tanisha’s death.
Tanisha Anderson Case Brings Mental Health Training To Ohio Police is a post from Cop Block – Badges Don't Grant Extra Rights
Source: http://www.copblock.org/142694/tanisha-anderson-case-brings-mental-health-training-to-ohio-police/
