NEW YORK – Yet another episode of brutal police violence in the United States. This time the victim, fortunately surviving, is a 12-year-old African American, involved in an argument with another student in the canteen of her school in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
The fact dates back to 4 March, but the institute’s managers have only now released the video taken by the security cameras. In the movie you can see Shawn Guetschow, an off-duty officer who worked as a school security officer, step in and wrestle with the little girl before falling to the ground and banging her head against a table. At that point the man throws the student down and presses his knee to the back of her neck for about 30 seconds. Then he cuffs her and takes her out of the cafeteria.
Jerrel Perez, the girl’s father, filed a lawsuit against Guetschow for using methods prohibited by Wisconsin law. And he reported that her daughter had to seek treatment from a neurologist.
Initially, the school administration put Guetschow on paid leave. The man later resigned from his part-time job, complaining that he was not sufficiently supported by the authorities and pointing out that the incident was putting his family under severe stress.
The latest complaint of this kind dates back to a few days ago, when a video came out in which a 38-year-old man is seen dying of suffocation by the policemen who had stopped him for a check-up. Just like George Floyd, but two months ago.
Kenosha has already been the scene of episodes of violence and very strong racial tensions. 23 August 2020 Jacob Blakea 29-year-old black man, had been shot seven times by bullets fired by the white policeman Resting Sheskey. The officer had been called in over a family dispute and feared he was under attack. Blake wasn’t dead, but he was paralyzed. Those were the days when protest over Floyd’s death was rampant and in Kenosha people had taken to the streets. There had been riots and the city was under siege. Kyle Rittenhouse, a 17-year-old white man who lived in Antioch (Illinois), about thirty kilometers away, had decided to restore order and on 25 August he had gone to Kenosha with a semi-automatic rifle. With that rifle he had killed Joseph Rosenbaum36 years old, e Anthony Huber, 26, and had injured the 27-year-old Gaige Grosskreutz.