A deaf Black man with cerebral palsy faced charges of resisting arrest and aggravated assault — now the police officers who arrested him are under investigation.
Two Phoenix police officers — Benjamin Harris and Kyle Sue — tackled 34-year-old Tyron McAlpin on August 19 before repeatedly punching and tasing him, body camera footage reveals. The surveillance video sparked intense scrutiny when it was released on Tuesday, prompting the Maricopa County Attorney to review the case.
Disturbing bodycam footage captured McAlpin looking down at his phone while walking through a parking lot when officers drive up in a police vehicle. McAlpin changes directions as if not wanting to hit the car.
“Hey buddy, stop where you’re at,” an officer said as the car pulled up next to McAlpin.
Surveillance footage shows that almost instantly, one officer jumps out of the car, lunges at McAlpin and grabs him. The officer wrote in the probable cause statement that McAlpin “positioned his body in a fighting stance” — but footage shows that the 34-year-old appears to try to fight his way out of the officer’s grasp.
That’s when things turn violent.
While the pair were in a brawl, the second officer approaches, grabs McAlpin’s torso, swings him around and drags him to the ground, face-down. The officers then tase and punch the deaf man as he is pinned on the floor.
“Put your hands behind your back!” one officer yells over the sound of McAlpin screams.
He was put into custody, charged with two counts of assaulting a police officer and one count of resisting arrest, court records show.
The officers then groan about potential injuries from the skirmish. One thinks he broke his hand while the other questions whether McAlpin had bit him. An attorney for McAlpin told NBC News that his client didn’t bite the officer and instead chalked up their injuries as being a result of a “frenzied and violent attack on Tyron.”
Not long after, a woman approaches the group and says McAlpin is her husband and he was on the phone with her when the incident unfolded.
“Well, he’s under arrest for assault on a police officer,” one officer responds.
She explains that McAlpin has a disability. “He’s deaf and he’s got cerebral palsy. And I’ve been on the phone with him since Circle K,” a convenience store where police said the other incident they were investigating occurred allegedly involving him.
A police report obtained by The Independent states that a white man accused a black man — later identified as McAlpin — of “trying to take” his bike in a Circle K store before they got into a physical fight. McAlpin faces no charges related to these allegations.
The officer then questioned how she was able to speak on the phone with her husband if he was deaf. She said: “I know sign language. I sign to him.”
“It’s hard for me to see how the city can come out and say with (a) straight face that it is meeting the DOJ report head-on when this man is being charged with assault on police officers for this incident,” said Jesse Showalter, one of McAlpin’s attorneys, told ABC7.
Showalter told the Washington Post that his client didn’t comply with officers’ orders because he is deaf.
A spokesperson from the Phoenix Police Department told The Independent in a statement: “This incident is the subject of an ongoing internal investigation and was assigned to the Professional Standards Bureau on August 30, 2024.”
The disturbing footage was released on Tuesday, prompting backlash from civil rights groups and elected officials.
Andre Miller, Vice President of the Arizona State Conference NAACP, told CBS News in a statement: “This brutal assault was due to the false claims of a white citizen, reminiscent of many falsehoods like Emmit Till that have claimed the lives of black citizens in America.”
Miller continued: “Tyron was not a suspect in an actual crime, he had not done anything wrong, and he also has communication challenges, his assault happened seconds after the police vehicle was put in park. No true communication in this encounter was present.”
The Arizona Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing told the outlet it was “disheartened by this incident.”
Arizona State Rep Analise Ortiz, whose district includes parts of Maricopa County, wrote on X: “Tyron McAlpin was brutally assaulted by Phoenix Police. This department has learned nothing from the DOJ investigation and continues to use excessive force, racially profile, and violate the rights of disabled Arizonans. Tyron deserves justice and the charges must be dropped.”
Ortiz was referring to a June report by the Justice Department that found that the Phoenix Police Department “discriminates against Black, Hispanic, and Native American people when enforcing the law” as well as those with behavioral disabilities and routinely uses “excessive force” while on the job.
In the wake of the surveillance video’s release, Rachel Mitchell, Maricopa County Attorney, has vowed to review the case.
“Some in our community have voiced their concerns regarding the charges against Tyron McAlpin. I have great faith in the attorneys who work at MCAO and those who have reviewed this case so far,” Mitchell said in a statement to The Independent. “Because of the attention on this case, I will personally review the entire file, as well as the totality of the video. I may reach a different conclusion, or I may not, but I believe this case merits additional scrutiny.”
Officers Harris and Sue are still actively working in the force, the Phoenix Police Department told CNN.
The Independent has emailed an attorney for McAlpin and the Maricopa County Attorney for comment.
