A Vermont mother has filed a lawsuit alleging that police used excessive force and discriminated against her unarmed Black son with behavioral and intellectual disabilities.

What happened next that evening in May 2021 is the basis for a lawsuit by the mother alleging that Burlington police used excessive force and discriminated against her unarmed son, who is Black and has behavioral and intellectual disabilities.

After he failed to hand over the last of the stolen e-cigarettes, two officers physically forced him to do so, then Cathy Austrian’s son was handcuffed and pinned to the ground as he screamed and struggled, according to a civil lawsuit filed Tuesday and police body-camera video shared with The Associated Press by the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont.

The teen eventually was injected with a ketamine, a sedative, then taken to a hospital, according to the lawsuit and video.

  • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.works
    38·
    10 months ago

    Let’s have police reform and additional training or more services!

    Also…

    PARENT YOUR OWN KIDS. Don’t call the cops on your underage children to “teach a lesson” you’re the parent, YOU do it. That call doesn’t come with a lesson, it comes with a pretty larceny charge to help with your kid’s “bad week”.