Daniel Prude of Chicago, Illinois, United States has died. He was 41.
Prude suffered from mental health issues. He spent his final days at his older brother Joseph “Joe” D. Prude‘s residence in Rochester, New York, USA.
How did Daniel Prude die?
In the early morning of March 23, 2020, Daniel suffered an acute, manic, psychotic episode in Rochester where he was visiting Joe. The former ran out of the house so the latter called the police for help.
As shown in a Facebook Live video of one witness, Daniel was undressing and defecating in the street. Several other people called the police, too, including a tow truck driver who described him to the police as a naked, bloodied man trying to open the door of a locked car.
Two emergency medical technicians including Brett Barnes arrived. They were with seven Rochester Police Department officers namely Mark Vaughn, Troy Taladay, Francisco Santiago, Paul Ricotta, Andrew Specksgoor, Josiah Harris and Michael Magri.
At 3:16 a.m., the cops approached Daniel, who was kneeling naked in the middle of a snowy wet street. Vaughn pointed a Taser at Daniel and asked him six times to get on the ground and the latter complied.
“In Jesus Christ I pray, Amen,” Daniel repeatedly said while handcuffed. He repeatedly yelled at the cops and asked them to give their guns to him.
“You don’t got AIDS, do you?” One of the officers asked Daniel. “You got HIV?”
At 3:19 a.m., Daniel yelled at the cops that he has the new coronavirus (COVID-19) and continuously spat in their direction. When he sat up, Vaughn put a white spit hood over his head.
“Calm down,” Vaughn told Daniel. “Stop spitting.”
“You’re trying to kill me!” Daniel yelled. He kept yelling at them so they pulled him to the ground.
Vaughn pushed Daniel’s head into the ground and held him there for 2 minutes and 15 seconds. Eventually, Daniel’s shouts turned into muffled voice then silence.
The spit hood was then removed from Daniel’s head and Barnes administer CPR. Paramedics arrived at 3:21 a.m. and at 3:27 a.m., Daniel was loaded into an ambulance.
“A racist police officer saw a black man in need and decided that he just didn’t deserve to live,” Daniel’s daughter Tashyra Prude said during a press conference on September 2, 2020. In an interview with The Associated Press, as cited by Chicago Tribune, she said her father “should have been met with a mental health specialist.”
On September 4, 2020, Rochester mayor Lovely Warren announced the suspension of the seven police officers involved in the fatal suffocation of Daniel. The cops will still receive salaries while suspended.
CONAN Daily 