August 12, 2011

Taser Death: Debro Wilkerson (Prince William County, MD)

It happened again. This time an unarmed 29-year old Black man was electrocuted to death by Prince William County police. He hadn't committed a crime. In fact, his family called 911 to have an ambulance take him to the hospital because of his asthma condition. 29-year old Debro Lamonte Wilkerson decided that he didn't want to go to the hospital. [SOURCE]

The Prince William County police officers who came on the scene decided that Wilkerson's decision was made in a "combative" manner. As such, the police officers thought it was good to taser the man multiple times at 50,000 volts on each taser shock ... until the young man simply stopped breathing and died.

He was unarmed. He had committed no crime. He didn't deserve to die. The only reason that he's dead is because some taser-happy cops were too lazy to calmly assess the situation ... rather they felt a need to pull their taser guns on Mr. Wilkerson and kill him.






Police say Wilkerson lunged at a police officer. In self defense the officer deployed a taser. I imagine that the police will eventually claim that the young man was on drugs. That is usually what they do in these post-taser-death moments.

Officers were able to put one handcuff on Wilkerson when he suddenly jumped up and ran out the side door of the ambulance. Why? Why would the police try to put handcuffs on a man who simply didn't want to go to the hospital. Is there some law that says you have to jump into the ambulance when you haven't called it yourself?

Police are spinning the story to say that he assaulted a relative while yelling at police and continuing to be disorderly. Police told him to let her go or they would deploy pepper spray. Wilkerson let her go and was placed in handcuffs.

Police say while walking him back to the ambulance he told them he had been using heroin and PCP. Of course, we can't verify this statement with Mr. Wilkerson BECAUSE HE'S DEAD!

Once back in the ambulance Police said Wilkerson lunged at them and ran out the back door of the ambulance.


Police caught up to him and deployed a taser to stop him. Wilkerson continued to resist as he fell to the ground. Police said they continued to struggle with him as he continued to resist.

They started to lose his vital signs once they got him back to the ambulance. He was transported to the hospital where he was pronounced dead.

The officer who killed Mr. Wilkerson hasn't been identified. I guess we will learn more as the investigation goes forward.

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