{"id":21764,"date":"2023-12-23T03:00:11","date_gmt":"2023-12-23T09:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=21764"},"modified":"2023-12-23T03:00:17","modified_gmt":"2023-12-23T09:00:17","slug":"police-fatally-shoot-black-woman-who-called-911-for-domestic-violence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=21764","title":{"rendered":"Police fatally shoot Black woman who called 911 for domestic violence"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A Los Angeles<\/a> county sheriff\u2019s deputy shot and killed a 27-year-old woman who had called 911 to report that she was under attack by a former boyfriend, police officials and lawyers for the victim\u2019s family said on Thursday. Records show the deputy had killed another person in similar circumstances three years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 4 December, Niani Finlayson called police and \u201creported that her boyfriend would not leave her alone and then screaming and sounds of a struggle could be heard\u201d, the LA sheriff\u2019s department (LASD) said in a statement. When deputies arrived at the apartment in Lancaster, a city in the northern region of LA county, they could hear screaming, LASD said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finlayson was inside with her nine-year-old daughter and had been injured by her ex-boyfriend and wanted him removed, her family\u2019s attorneys said. The exact circumstances that led to the fatal shooting are unclear and LASD has so far declined to release body-camera footage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LASD alleged in a statement that Finlayson had a knife and was threatening her boyfriend, at which point deputy Ty Shelton opened fire. The family disputed the police account, saying Finlayson was clearly a victim of domestic violence who needed help and posed no threat to the officers. The coroner said<\/a> she died from \u201cmultiple gunshot wounds\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finlayson was a mother of two, and her daughter, Xaisha, witnessed the shooting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe police lied that my mom was threatening them,\u201d Xaisha said at a press conference on Thursday alongside her grandparents, calling for Shelton to be prosecuted. \u201cShe was my best friend. She was always there for me. It\u2019s unbelievable that she\u2019s gone and she\u2019s not coming back. I miss my mom.\u201d The girl said her two-year-old sister continues to ask where their mother is and she doesn\u2019t know how to respond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finlayson\u2019s family<\/a> filed a legal claim against the county and sheriff\u2019s department on Thursday, alleging wrongful death, assault and civil rights violations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou have someone who is calling the police for help, and she gets killed by the police who she\u2019s asking for assistance,\u201d said Bradley Gage, the family\u2019s attorney. \u201cIf you call police for help, you think the officers are going to protect and serve you. You don\u2019t expect them to hunt and kill you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LASD said in a statement Thursday it had not officially received the family\u2019s claim, but would be releasing body-camera footage by next week. The inspector general\u2019s office would conduct a \u201crobust review process \u2026 where every aspect of the shooting is thoroughly examined and evaluated to see if department policies and procedures were followed\u201d, and the LA district attorney\u2019s office would determine whether the shooting was legally justified, the statement said, adding: \u201cThe department is deeply committed to protecting our diverse communities without bias and prejudice.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shelton could not be reached and the sheriff\u2019s deputy union did not immediately respond to an inquiry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Previously, Shelton killed Michael Thomas, 61, on 11 June 2020 in a similar case. Shelton had been responding to a potential <\/strong>domestic violence call and when the deputies arrived, they demanded he open the door, officials said. Thomas\u2019s girlfriend later said<\/a> she had been having a verbal argument with Thomas, who had been unarmed, and that he had tried to stop the officers from entering, citing the fourth amendment. Thomas had also been afraid police would shoot him<\/a>, his family said, and officials later confirmed Thomas had said: \u201cI am now in fear for my life. You guys \u2026 just killed somebody.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shelton fatally shot Thomas in the chest. The killing was not captured on camera. The case was one in a series of LASD killings that summer that caused widespread protests<\/a>, and prosecutors declined<\/a> to file charges against Shelton. LASD did not respond to questions about Shelton\u2019s previous killing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finlayson\u2019s mother, Tracie Hall, said her daughter had been working to become a nurse and an in-home care service worker, designed her own clothes and wanted to make a phone app for children. \u201cI\u2019m going to miss my daughter braiding my hair, the simple things. It\u2019s so unfair,\u201d she said, adding: \u201cI hope Ty Shelton looks himself in the mirror and says: \u2018I have destroyed another life for no reason.\u2019 [He] put my granddaughter in so much danger.\u201dskip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.google.com\/recaptcha\/api2\/anchor?ar=1&k=6LdzlmsdAAAAALFH63cBVagSFPuuHXQ9OfpIDdMc&co=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cudGhlZ3VhcmRpYW4uY29tOjQ0Mw..&hl=zh-CN&type=image&v=u-xcq3POCWFlCr3x8_IPxgPu&theme=light&size=invisible&badge=bottomright&cb=x5811hbvea0jPrivacy Notice:\u00a0<\/strong>Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our\u00a0Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google\u00a0Privacy Policy<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Terms of Service<\/a>\u00a0apply.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe should not be allowed to roam free and continue to have a job and provide for his family, because my daughter is not here to provide for her family,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finlayson\u2019s father, Lamont Finlayson, said she had recently moved into the apartment and was excited to celebrate her first holidays there: \u201cIt just breaks me to my bone. I can\u2019t eat, I can\u2019t sleep, I can\u2019t walk \u2026 <\/strong>they didn\u2019t tase her, mace her, baton her or beanbag her. They just shot her like a dog in her own place \u2026 and taken so much away from us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Myesha Lopez, Thomas\u2019s daughter, said on Thursday that she was furious, but not surprised to learn that Shelton had fatally shot another person: \u201cHe\u2019s been given a license to kill \u2026 and again he violated someone\u2019s civil rights by going to their home and murdering them.\u201d She said it was particularly upsetting considering how she and others had protested and warned that Shelton was dangerous: \u201cIt is the fruition of my greatest fear \u2013 that someone else would relive what I experienced.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Local advocates in the Antelope Valley region in northern LA county have called for Shelton to be fired and charged.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe want him out of there and prosecuted and not just moved to another county to stay in law enforcement,\u201d said Waunette Cullors, a co-founder of Cancel the Contract, a group that is assisting the family and that organizes against police brutality in the area. \u201cThere is no accountability. The sheriff keeps finding excuses to validate murdering us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sheriff\u2019s department has repeatedly been accused of using brutal force against Black women in the region. In June, a deputy was caught on camera throwing a woman to the ground<\/a> outside a Lancaster grocery store and placing his knee<\/a> on top of her. The woman had been recording a police encounter. LASD also released footage in July<\/a> of an encounter in Palmdale, a neighboring city, in which a deputy was seen punching a woman twice in the face as she held her newborn baby.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSheriffs are running rampant in Antelope Valley and are allowed to harm Black women especially and nothing is happening,\u201d said Cullors. \u201cEveryone considers it to be a norm.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

theguardian<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Los Angeles county sheriff\u2019s deputy shot and killed a 27-year-old woman who had called 911 to report that she was under attack by a former boyfriend, police officials and lawyers for the victim\u2019s family said on Thursday. Records show the deputy had killed another person in similar circumstances three years ago. On 4 December, Niani Finlayson […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":21765,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1154],"tags":[3869,25257,2094,5250,1237],"class_list":["post-21764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending","tag-3869","tag-black-woman","tag-call","tag-domestic-violence","tag-police"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21764"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21764\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21766,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21764\/revisions\/21766"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}