Friday while behavioral therapist Charles Kinsey was attempting to return a runaway autistic patient to a halfway house Miami he was shot by police. A 911 call to authorities was placed, in which the caller stated there was a man attempting to commit suicide in the street. When police arrived, the autistic patient was sitting in the street playing with a toy truck. Kinsey decided the best way to not get shot was to lay on the ground with his hands in the air, to appear as non-threatening as possible. Despite this strategy Johnathan Aledda fired three shots at the men, one bullet entered Kinsey's leg.
In the aftermath a second officer, Emile Hollant, was suspended after lying to investigators as part of a cover-up.
North Miami's police union representative John Riveria made a public statement trying to justify the shooting:
Many officers thought the white male had a firearm. Only much later, when we're able to Monday morning quarterback, do we find out that it's a toy. Only much later do we find out that the individual was autistic.
The justification seems to be a lie. In a cell phone video recording taken from a bystander at the scene, Kinsey can be heard yelling to officers the autistic patient was holding a truck and not arming a weapon. Even with alleged SWAT training Aledda not only missed his claimed target, he put a bullet in a black man.
In a moment of zen, Kinsey stated to a local news station:
When he hit me, I'm like, I still got my hands in the air.
I'm like, 'Sir, why did you shoot me?'
He said to me, 'I don't know.'