Black Man Dies In Police Custody After Being Shot With Taser - Police Stopped the Wrong Man
Wednesday, March 9, 2005 at 01:57PM
TheSpook
Two DeLand police officers are off the
job after a man they were trying to arrest died in custody. Willie
Michael Towns died shortly after he was shot with a taser during a
struggle with the officers. The ironic part of this story is, Towns
wasn't even the man the police were looking for. DeLand police were
looking for a burglary suspect named Mike. They saw Towns and he fit
the description, but he was not the man they were looking for. Police
approached him on Woodland Boulevard to ask him some questions. For
some reason, he took off. Police didn't even bother with pursuit. But
then Towns was spotted on the roof of a building. Police say they had
no choice but to chase him then. The suspect jumped from the roof to a
metal awning. He was going to try to jump to the ground, but decided to
break a window and go inside the building, according to the police
report. Two officers tackled Towns who, they say, tried repeatedly to
jump out the second floor window. They also tasered him three times,
with apparently no effect. Towns later admitted doing cocaine that day.
Officers finally subdued Towns, strapped him to a board and put him in
an ambulance where, the report says, he began fighting with paramedics,
then suddenly stopped. Towns was dead. Once again, police are left
wondering why this happened. The autopsy report will be out Tuesday. [more]
Article originally appeared on (http://brownwatch.com/).
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