American Indian mother of two dies in police custody - pleas for help ignored

[Zacha341]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/0...r-help-ignored

From DK article:

The ugly American secret has been exposed. All across the country, women and men are dying in police custody and have been by the thousands every year. Four days before Sandra Bland was arrested in Waller County, Texas, a 24-year-old American Indian woman of the Lakota tribe, Sarah Lee Circle Bear of Clairmont, South Dakota, was arrested on a simple bond violation.

Witnesses stated that before being transferred to a holding cell, Circle Bear pleaded to jailers that she was in excruciating pain. Jail staff responded by dismissing her cries for help, telling her to “knock it off,” and “quit faking.” Inmates cried out for the jail staff to help Circle Bear, to which they eventually responded by picking her up off of the floor, dragging her out of the cell, and transferring her to a holding cell. Circle Bear was later found unresponsive in the holding cell.

[gazhekwe]

And after a month, "Autopsy results are inconclusive."

And Rexdale Henry, Choctaw activist arrested for unpaid fines, died in jail in Mississippi July 14. Autopsy results still pending.

http://www.mintpressnews.com/another...ustody/207999/

Christina Tahhawah died in police custody in Lawton Oklahoma November 13, 2104 after her family requested her to be taken to the hospital. She was instead taken to jail where she was found unresponsive a short time later. 'The family went to the hospital and there heard that fellow jail inmates were saying that Christina Tahhahwah had been tasered [repeatedly] for refusing to stop singing Comanche hymns. The Lawton police say no Tasers were used.'

http://www.womeninandbeyond.org/?p=19060

[Pam]

Here's a scary article I read recently:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10027012236

Americans are wondering, “What’s wrong with our police?” Remarkably, one of the most compelling but unexplored explanations may rest with a FBI warning of October 2006, which reported that “White supremacist infiltration of law enforcement” represented a significant national threat."

I guess they need to fire everybody and start over. The body cam idea is a joke. Getting filmed has not stopped the violence.

[gazhekwe]

Published on Indian Country Today Media Network.com[[http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com)

Cellmate Is Suspect in Death of Choctaw Man, Police Say;
Choctaw Issue Statement7/31/15C

Authorities in Philadelphia, Mississippi, have named a suspect in thesuspicious death of Native American activist and medicine man RexdaleHenry.

Justyn Schlegel, 34, was in the Neshoba County Jail cell with Henrywhen police found him dead, Sheriff Tommy Waddell said, according toWAPT News. Schlegel is now being charged with Henry’s murder.

Police arrested Henry on July 9 for failing to pay a minor traffic citation.According to reports, Henry was last seen alive at 9:30 a.m. on July 14,but by 10 a.m. he was deceased.

Henry was a member of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians and was recently a candidate for tribal council. The tribe said in a statement released Friday that they are mourning the loss of Henry and are working with authorities to reveal what occurred leading up to his death.
“I, along with the entire tribal community, am saddened by the loss of Mr. Henry. I am committed to working with authorities to see justice served in this case,” Tribal Chief Phyliss Anderson said in a statement. “Please continue to keep the Henry family in your thoughts and prayers.”
The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation is reportedly looking into the crime. Anonymous donors paid to have Henry’s body flown to Florida for an independent autopsy.
The suspicious death of Henry is the latest in several cases like his that have recently sparked national attention. On July 13 – one day before Henry’s death –Sandra Bland, an African American woman, was found hanging in a Waller County, Texas, jail cell. Medical examiners ruled her death a suicide, but Bland’s family argued that she would not have killed herself given all she had to live for.
Less than week before Bland’s death, a Lakota mother of two, Sarah Lee Circle Bear, was found unconscious on July 6 in a jail cell in Aberdeen, South Dakota. Circle Bear was later taken to a hospital where she died.
Witnesses said they heard Circle Bear pleading to jailers who was, according to them, suffering from excruciating pain. The jailers allegedly told her to “knock it off” and “quit faking.”

Read more athttp://indiancountrytodaymedianetwor...atement-161256