By The Opinion
04 Nov 2024, 20:37 PM EST
Ohio prosecutors announced manslaughter charges against two police officers in the death of a man who was handcuffed and left face down on the floor of a social club in Canton while telling officers he couldn’t breathe.
Stark County Prosecutor Kyle Stone told reporters Saturday that charges against Canton officers Beau Schoenegge and Camden Burch were brought by a grand jury by the death on April 18 of Frank Tyson, a 53-year-old East Canton resident arrested shortly after a car accident that had severed a utility pole.
Police body camera footage showed Tyson, who was black, resisting and repeatedly saying, “They’re trying to kill me” and “Call the sheriff” as he was taken to the ground, and he told officers he couldn’t breathe. .
The officers told Tyson that he was fine, to calm down and stop fighting while they handcuffed him face down, and the officers joked with bystanders and searched Tyson’s wallet before realizing he was in a medical crisis.
The county coroner’s office ruled Tyson’s death a homicide in August. and also mentioned a heart condition and cocaine and alcohol intoxication as contributing factors.
Stone said the charges were third-degree felonies punishable by a maximum sentence of 36 months in prison and a $10,000 fine.
The Stark County Sheriff’s Office confirmed Saturday that Schoenegge and Burch had been booked into the county jail.
Tyson family attorney Bobby DiCello said in a statement that the arrests were a relief because the officers involved in what he called Tyson’s “inhumane and brutal death” will not escape prosecution.
But he called it “bittersweet because it makes official what they have known for a long time: Frank is a victim of homicide.”
Tyson had been released from state prison on April 6 after serving 24 years for a kidnapping and robbery case and was almost immediately declared a violator of post-release monitoring supervision for failing to report to a parole officer, according to the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction.
With information from AP
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