Black Deaf man gets handcuffed after calling 911
Renca: On Sunday, September 17th, a Black Deaf man named Francis Phiri, who lives in Menlo Park, California, had a medical emergency at home, and his partner called 911. The EMT arrived, and then the police arrived, and Francis ended up getting handcuffed by the police on a stretcher. With Francis’ permission, we will show a video his partner took and some images. We want to warn you that some of those images may be disturbing.
[two clips & one image]
Francis is saying what happened on September 17th at his home was audism, racism, and police brutality. We reached out to Francis to explain to us what happened.
Francis: I was at home at that moment this awful situation happened to me. It was really unexpected. So it was Sunday night and I wasn’t feeling well. My heart was beating fast, I had a fever, I couldn’t move, and it was difficult to breathe. I decided it would be best to ask my girlfriend to call 911. She’s Deaf and Black too. I asked her to call 911 to help me and she made the call. We waited. We called through Convo. Finally a group of EMTs arrived, all men.
I ran outside and I was sitting at the front door of my building. I said to them, “Please, take me to the hospital now. I’m feeling sick, I don’t feel well,” and one of the EMTs wanted to have a conversation about what happened. I told them I was Deaf and again I said, “Please, I’m begging you take me to the hospital now!” My girlfriend asked if she could get water and they blocked her, telling her no. I’m sitting there like, I need help and that’s your job, please.
The EMTs are insisting that first they need to know what happened. I’m sick! I need to be taken to the hospital now, I’m begging! They’re talking with each other. They put a blood pressure cuff on me for a test, I’m confused and I keep asking to be brought to the hospital. Then shockingly a group of police arrive which throws me off. What could they be here for? We called to request EMTs, not police. Okay, I try to be patient as the police are saying to calm down. I explained that I needed a hospital. I told my girlfriend that it feels like they are trying to kill me or what. They were not doing anything.
Finally we’re getting ready to go to the hospital, and they need to transport me on a stretcher. I’m cooperating and I see someone on the team grabbing something. He walks toward me and all of a sudden he’s wrestling to handcuff me to the stretcher. He’s pinning my head down to restrain me and get me cuffed! My shoulder was in serious pain and so was my leg. I couldn’t understand why it was happening. My girlfriend ran up telling them to stop and she was recording it too, and they were trying to block her. You can see it in the video, we were trying to communicate with them and we just couldn’t.
Instead of just helping to transport me, I was handcuffed. As my girlfriend came in, one guy was using his leg to pin my head down. You can see in the pictures he was putting his weight on me. I needed medical attention, I needed a hospital. Why did I get hurt, why did I get handcuffed? I didn’t need restraints, I didn’t do anything wrong. Plus they gave me a sedative to calm down. I wasn’t allowed to protest, I just got knocked out. I didn’t wake up until I was in the ER. My girlfriend wasn’t there, really, no one was there.
It was all so awful. And my tests came back stating that I had low blood sugar and white cells. So they gave me four rounds of IV and I was also drinking orange juice. By the morning I was cleared to go home. I was struggling, it was completely traumatizing. It made me realize, how can I trust this again? You know when you call a hospital and the message will say, “If this is an emergency, please hang up and dial 911”? How can I trust that again? How can the Black and Deaf communities trust this and feel safe doing it? What is safe for us?
Renca: With everything that’s happened, do you plan on taking action?
Francis: If they aren’t held responsible for what they’ve done I won’t understand. I’m sure we can all agree that we can’t stand for this kind of treatment, asking for medical attention and ending up with handcuffs and additional injuries. I will have to take legal action now. I plan to work with a lawyer and collect all of the evidence. And I’ll keep everyone updated because it’s important they take accountability for what they did. I’ve already seen my community, my friends who are Deaf and Hard of Hearing receive poor treatment, and even more in the Black community. We need to have trust when we call 911. It needs to be safe for us as well, not just for white people or whoever the system was designed for.
[interview ends]
Renca: Thank you Francis for your time. We also reached out to the Menlo Park Police Department for their statement. This is what they said to us via email.
“This incident was in our jurisdiction in Menlo Park, which was a medical call only. Our officers provided assistance to the medical personnel and patient. There was no arrest. Because of the medical situation, there is no further information.”
We looked at the U.S. Department of Justice website for the Disability Rights Section, it mentions that Title II of the American Disabilities Act (ADA) prohibits State and local government from discriminating against an individual with a disability, including a requirement that they are supposed to provide aids or services to ensure the deaf or hard of hearing person understands what law enforcement is saying.
—-------
[Sponsored video from Convo: www.convorelay.com]
—--------
Link to Francis’ post: https://www.facebook.com/francis.r.phiri/posts/pfbid0ehwZVjT5y4WkganEBJvq5pZQeHT4eSziU2J3faqnBso1AZNoLg2SYB5NGKN3rFWGl
FBI: https://leb.fbi.gov/articles/additional-articles/police-practice-safe-restraint-of-agitated-patients