Page 22 - Florida Sentinel 6-21-19

National
Arizona Family Held At
New Jersey Man Becomes
Gunpoint Files $10M
Latest American Tourist
Lawsuit Against Police
To Die At A Dominican
PHOENIX, AZ - A Phoenix family is filing a ten million dollar lawsuit against the Phoenix Police Department, as announced by the family's lawyer in a press conference on Monday.
On May 27, 2019, Phoenix police surrounded the family's car outside a Family Dollar, with guns drawn, after the family's four-year-old child al- legedly wandered out of the store holding a doll that had not been paid for. The police say they were responding to an anonymous tip that shoplifting had occurred. Police also stated that the father, Dravon Ames, stole a pair of under- wear and — upon police arrival — was found driving with a suspended license.
After weeks of by-stander- filmed cellphone footage of the incident sparking outrage on social media, the family is fi- nally speaking out.
During Monday's press conference, the children's mother, Iesha Harper, told CBS, "I thought something bad was going to happen to me and my children at that moment. I thought I was going to be shot like [the officer] told me...."
When asked how he felt during the terrifying ordeal, Ames replied, "I thought he
A New Jersey man died last week while staying at a resort in the Dominican Republic, be- coming at least the ninth Amer- ican tourist to die under mysterious circumstances
while visiting Caribbean country.
the small
Republic Resort
Dravon Ames and Iesha Harper, center, seek justice after Phoenix police pull guns over alleged shoplifting incident.
Joseph Allen, 55, was found dead in his room Thurs- day at the Terra Linda Resort in Sosua, where he was celebrat- ing a friend's birthday, his fam- ily confirmed to NBC News.
Allen's sister-in-law said that the family was scrambling for answers.
A number of other families reported stories of their rela- tives mysteriously dying while staying at resorts in the Do- minican Republic.
Leyla Cox, 53, an MRI technician from Staten Island, was staying at the Excellence resort in Punta Cana when she
JOSEPH ALLEN
died on June 11, just a day after her birthday, according to her son. Will Cox said he still does not know his mother's cause of death and has not had the chance to mourn properly as her remains still haven't been returned home.
He also told NBC News that a representative for the U. S. Embassy said a toxicology test would not be conducted on his mother's body due to broken machines.
was going to shoot us. I'm just trying to protect my family, and being calm with someone who's going to shoot me is the best way out of that situation, so we can survive it."
It was during Monday's press conference that the fam- ily's attorney, Tom Horne, announced the lawsuit pub- licly. The lawsuit comes after over two weeks of no action from the Phoenix Police De- partment regarding the inci- dent. The family filed a notice of claim — the first step in fil- ing a lawsuit — on June 12, 2019, before announcing the impending lawsuit at the press conference.
On June 14, 2019, the Phoenix Police issued an apol- ogy for the family's experience,
via a video from the Chief of Police on the Department Facebook page. The following day, June 15th, the Mayor of Phoenix, Kate Gallego, is- sued a statement of apology to the family on her Twitter ac- count.
At Monday's press confer- ence, the family said they do not accept these apologies, and wish for all officers involved to be fired. The Phoenix Police suggest there has been a rush to judgment, but have placed all involved officers on desk duty pending the investigation. The Phoenix Police Chief and Mayor Gallego are expected to host a town hall at a local Phoenix church to discuss the incident with community members.
Slain N. C. Pregnant Woman
Manhattan D. A. Refuses To Review Thousands Of Past Sex Crime Convictions Following Central Park Five Series
A pregnant North Carolina woman was fatally shot two weeks after she testified as a witness against her ex- boyfriend in a capital murder trial.
On June 12, Tiyquasha Antwonique Simuel, 24, was found suffering from mul- tiple gunshot wounds near a West Asheville apartment com- plex, WPDE, the Charlotte Ob- server and Asheville Citizen Times report. She was trans- ported to a local hospital, where she succumbed to her injuries. Her baby survived.
Two weeks before her death, Simuel had testified as a witness for Buncombe County prosecutors in a capital murder trial against her ex- boyfriend, Nathaniel Dixon.
Dixon is accused of mur- dering Candice Pickens in 2016 and also attempting to murder her 3-year-old son, who as a result lost his eye and suffered severe brain injury.
Pickens was pregnant when she was killed. Prosecu- tors allege Dixon killed Pick- ens because she would not terminate her pregnancy. They believe he is the father of her unborn child.
Dixon has been charged with first-degree murder, first- degree murder of an unborn child, first-degree attempted murder and child abuse while
TIYQUASHA ANTWONIQUE SIMUEL
inflicting serious injury. He has pleaded not guilty.
A heavily pregnant Simuel testified that she was with Dixon on the night of the shooting and the next day went to McDowell County with him so he could pay a ticket. The pair then made an impromptu trip to Ohio as a result of Pick- ens’ family allegedly threaten- ing them, the Citizen Times reports.
Dixon was arrested in Ohio. Simuel acknowledged that at the time she told a de- tective she did not believe Dixon committed the crimes.
A day after Simeul’s death, the Citizen Times spoke to a man who asked not be identified but said he was her boyfriend and father of her child. He said he was with her when she was shot but he did not believe she was the in- tended target.
Amid public outcry over Manhattan former assistant D. A. Linda Fairstein’s han- dling of the Central Park Five case, the current D.A. is resist- ing calls to reopen thousands of sex crime cases between 1976 and 2002.
District Attorney Cyrus Vance is refusing a request from Public Advocate Ju- maane Williams to reopen the cases. He also said he won’t fire Elizabeth Lederer, the assistant D. A. who worked on the Central Park Five case, calling her “an attorney in good standing in this office.”
Williams letter is part of a recent backlash after the debut of Ava Duvernay’s Netflix miniseries, “When They See Us,” which premiered on May 31 and depicts the infamous case.
“I do not intend to take ei- ther action at this time,” Vance wrote in a letter to
LINDA FAIRSTEIN AND ELIZABETH LEDERER
Williams, according to The New York Daily News, al- though he admitted the Cen- tral Park Five case “was a profound injustice.”
The Neighborhood De- fender Service of Harlem, the Legal Aid Society and the New York County Defender Services were also copied in Vance’s letter.
Williams and the three legal groups had asked Vance to review all the cases handled
by Lederer and Fairstein during the 26-year time pe- riod. Lederer served as lead prosecutor during the Central Park Five trial, and Feinstein led the Manhattan D. A.’s Sex Crimes Unit. The groups say in 1989, both women ignored ev- idence that should have cleared then-teenagers – Korey Wise, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana, Antron McCray and Yusef Salaam – before they ever stepped foot in a prison.
Instead the Black and Latino youths were tried and convicted in the brutal 1989 rape of white Central Park jog- ger Trisha Meili, and spent between six and 13 years in prison before being exonerated in 2002 after DNA evidence proved that the real rapist, Matias Reyes — who admit- ted to the assault — acted alone.
Was Witness In Recent
High-Profile Murder Trial
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