A Multnomah County grand jury has ruled that a Portland cop who fatally shot Andre Gladen, a legally blind man with schizophrenia, should not face criminal charges.
Gladen, 36, was shot by Officer Consider Vosu on January 6 after Desmond Pescaia, a Southeast Portland resident, called the police to ask officers to help remove Gladen from his front steps. Gladen, who was a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic, appeared at Pescaia’s front door after leaving the hospital, and was in an unstable mental state. After offering Gladen money for bus fare or food, Pescaia asked Gladen to leave. Instead, the 36-year-old man fell asleep on his porch. That’s when Pescaia requested PPB’s help.
Vosu showed up alone. When Gladen woke to see a cop walking towards him, he yelled and knocked on Pescaia’s door to let him inside. Pescaia did, and both Vosu and Gladen scuffled in his entryway. Vosu attempted to handcuff Gladen, then pepper sprayed him, and then—after Vosu said Gladen pulled out a knife—the officer shot him.
The tactical knife retrieved from the scene is similar to one police officers regularly carry. Gladen’s family disputed that the knife belonged to Gladen, and have argued that it would be impossible for the legally blind man to pull it off of Vosu’s belt. However, the grand jury ruling contends that Vosu was right to use deadly force against Gladen.
Gladen’s twin brother Fonte said he’s not at all surprised by the ruling.
“This is the norm. The world knows that,” he told the Mercury this morning. “You go in there and you expect the same legal system to charge those that are arms of the legal system? We know that’s not how it works.”
Six of Gladen’s family members (not including Fonte) are meeting with Mayor Ted Wheeler and Portland Police Chief Danielle Outlaw this morning, after requesting a meeting last week. They hope to share their concerns about Gladen’s death, and seek answers.
Fonte says he appreciates the city accepting the meeting, but doesn’t believe much will come from it.
“It’s a political move [for the city] to answer the family. It’s not going to change policing policies,” he said. “But to be able to look those who are partly responsible in the face, and say, ‘Something needs to change, something needs to be different,’ that’s important.”
Gladen’s death marked the third fatal shooting of someone with a mental illness by Portland police officers in the past year. Multnomah County grand juries cleared all officers in those deaths from any criminal charges. Gladen was also the third Black man to be shot by local law enforcement in the past year.
Despite the grand jury’s verdict, the Gladen family still intends to take legal action against Vosu and the city.
“We aren’t letting this fade away,” Fonte said. “They need to be accountable for something.”
Of course not. Fuck the police. They are nothing but government sanctioned, taxpayer funded murderers who have been given carte blanche to murder black people.
Life hack for journos: Shorten the headline to “No Charges for Cop who Fatally Shot Black Man.” 99 times out of 100, you can just paste it in as is!
More like you and Christina should create a copy and paste BS response of “F the police, they are in the wrong” for your ill-informed comments on cases like this, eprophet The facts are this: the guy charged into a residence where someone else was present, so at that point the cop had to follow him inside for the safety of the homeowner. Second, the cop pepper sprayed AND tased the guy, before he came at him with a knife. This is all according to the witness. Not sure what you expect the cop to do in that situation. And again, “not do anything until a team of trained mental health professionals can be summonsed to arrive on scene” was not an option here, as the guy entered the house of the person who called the cops in the first place.
Your comments are so idiotic and disrespectful, it really calls into question whether or not you should just give up internet trolling altogether. You are terrible at it.
Don’t worry, JTR, neither of these people have ever had to face a similar situation in their lives, so it’s easy to play armchair keyboard warrior. There are plenty of stories of cops using unjustified force out there, this simply isn’t one of them. To lump this instance into that category cheapens the dialogue and is really counter-productive.
I’m so tired of the Mercury’s biased reporting and leaving out key facts. This was a horrible event all around, but the way the Mercury tells it, the cop showed up wearing a white hood, confronted Andre in the middle of the nice homeowner inviting him inside for a warm spot of tea (“he yelled and knocked on Pescaia’s door to let him inside. Pescaia did.”), then pursued him into the home with a murderous rage in his eyes, tackled Andre, tased him and when that didn’t satisfy his primal racist urges to FINALLY murder a black man, shot him in cold blood and planted a knife.
Key facts not in the Mercury’s biased reporting:
“Pescaia (the homeowner) called police and when the officer arrived, Gladen ran inside the home through the open front door. According to Pescaia, Vosu followed Gladen inside. Gladen slipped and fell on the living room floor. Vosu tried to turn Gladen onto his stomach to handcuff him. Gladen then kicked the officer off and into a rear bedroom, Pescaia said.
When Gladen reached the entry to the bedroom, Vosu ordered Gladen to stand down several times before firing his Taser, Pescaia told The Oregonian/OregonLive. Gladen fell but got back up and Vosu, cornered in the rear bedroom, continued to order Gladen to stand down before firing three shots with his handgun, Pescaia said.
As Gladen fell down on his back, Pescaia said he saw a knife fall from Gladen’s right hand and land beside him.”
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Pescaia testified that he say the knife fall from Andre’s right hand. And in no other media outlet does it say that Pescaia allowed Andre into the home except here at the ol’ Mercury.
To be absolutely clear: I am, in no way, saying cops can do no wrong… they most definitely can and do. Look at the Laquan McDonald case… Officer Jason Van Dyke did kill him in cold blood and was rightfully convicted of murder. Do a simple YouTube search of “Police officer caught…” and you’ll find countless videos of police officers doing wrong. Look up “1st Amendment Audit” and you’ve find countless videos of police officers attempting to infringe on the rights of citizens… lying to them, illegally detaining them… etc.
What I am saying is that I don’t like biased reporting, I don’t it like when a “news” outlet intentionally leaves out key facts, and I don’t like when politically biased commenters use emotion and hindsight as their “argument,” rather than the facts.
Again, this was a sad and terrible situation all around.