AURORA, Colo. (AP) — Three officers were fired Friday over photos showing police reenact a chokehold used on Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old Black…
AURORA, Colo. (AP) — Three officers were fired Friday over photos showing police reenact a chokehold used on Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old Black man who died last year after police stopped him on the street in a Denver suburb.
One of those fired is Jason Rosenblatt, a white Aurora officer who helped stop McClain in August for wearing a ski mask and “being suspicious.” Police put McClain in a chokehold, paramedics injected him with a sedative and McClain suffered cardiac arrest before later being taken off life support.
Aurora Interim Police Chief Vanessa Wilson told reporters that officers sent the photos to Rosenblatt two months after McClain died. Rosenblatt responded with a text saying, “Haha.”
“We are ashamed, we are sickened, and we are angry,” Wilson said. The officers may not have committed a crime, but the photographs are “a crime against humanity and decency,” she added.
McClain’s death has become a rallying cry amid a national reckoning over police brutality and racial injustice, with the state reopening the case for possible criminal charges and federal officials looking into a civil rights investigation. In several places, the chokehold has been banned and other police reforms passed after nationwide protests.
McClain’s family, friends and community activists noted during a rally that justice was swifter for the mocking photograph than the use of force against McClain’s death. The two other officers who stopped the young man are still on the force as authorities look again into possible criminal charges after clearing them last year.
“Rosenblatt got fired not for killing Elijah, not for murdering Elijah, but for making fun of Elijah,” said Terrence Roberts, a community organizer and family friend.
