TWB Publisher: Was the media responsible for Lieutenant Pigott’s death?? Or was the NYPD responsible for providing poor training and mental health support to this officer?
ISLIP, N.Y. — As reported by NY Times reporter Timothy Williams, "To the mourners who solemnly and tentatively approached the dark brown coffin holding the body of Lt. Michael W. Pigott at a Long Island funeral home on Saturday afternoon, the unanswered questions following his suicide did not matter. "
NY Times' Timothy Williams reports, The wake was a time to provide protection and comfort to Lieutenant Pigott’s family by closing ranks. And several hundred officers from the New York Police Department and elsewhere sought to do that as they came to pay their respects at the Overton Funeral Home.
Lieutenant Pigott shot himself on Thursday, his 46th birthday, at a police training center in Brooklyn. The six-year veteran of the department’s Emergency Services Unit had been placed on modified duty after he had ordered another officer to fire a Taser stun gun at Iman Morales, 35, on Sept. 24. After Mr. Morales was struck by the Taser, he tumbled 10 feet to the sidewalk, hit his head and died.
Mr. Morales had been standing naked atop a storefront security gate in front of his building in Bedford-Stuyvesant, screaming and swinging an eight-foot-long fluorescent light tube. The police said he was trying to jab an officer on a nearby fire escape.
The police later said that use of the Taser had violated department guidelines.On Saturday afternoon, clusters of officers stood around a Police Department truck outside the funeral home as more than 100 people gathered inside. Lieutenant Pigott, who was married and the father of three children, lay in his dress uniform with a spray of red roses. A banner that proclaimed “Beloved Husband” lay on the coffin’s closed lower half.
A photo triptych sat to the right: a faded picture of the lieutenant as a young man holding a six-pack of Schmidt’s beer, with a group of officers; a wedding picture of him and his wife, Susan, walking down the aisle; and a photo of him with his sons at a Yankees game in 2006.
After the wake, one guest blamed reporters for Lieutenant Pigott’s death. “You people are half of what caused this, O.K.?” he said. “The media and the pressure you put on this man that did nothing wrong, you are responsible.”
TWB Publisher: I guess tasers can help and hinder police. What do you think. Was the media responsible for Lieutenant Pigott’s death?? Or was the NYPD responsible for providing poor training and mental health support to this officer?
Cross posted on African American Political Pundit.com
The publisher of this blog is also the publisher of African American Political Pundit.com
We are not against taser use as an alternative to deadly force. We are however against taser abuse by police who would use of a taser on the young, elderly, pregnant or physically frail; people offering passive, rather than active resistance; and restrained prisoners.
The publisher of this blog is available to conduct presentations on the issue of taser use for police agencies, governmental bodies, and groups in the U.S. and abroad.
Contact him via email at: tasedwhileblack@gmail.com
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