Baltimore Demands Answers after Man has 80% of Spinal Cord Severed in Police Custody

Residents of the city of Baltimore are demanding answers after a man who was arrested in a manner the police described as peaceful died after 80% of his spinal cord was severed at the neck.

The Baltimore Sun reports that 25-year-old Freddie Gray died a week after sustaining the injury, for which the Baltimore Police Department has no coherent explanation. Additionally, the severity and violate nature of the injury conflict with the official police records the arresting officers filed about the arrest.

Gray was injured April 12 after a group of bicycle officers tried to stop him. He ran away, and was then captured by the police. At the time of his capture, he was carrying a switchblade knife. The police claim they stopped Gray because he was participating in drug dealing activity, but there seems to be little evidence to support this assertion.

In the police report regarding the arrest, the arrest is described as non-violent, but a cell phone video of the incident shows Gray screaming as he is tossed into the back of a police van. After arriving at the police station, the police called for an ambulance that took Gray to a hospital, where he spent the rest of his life in a coma before passing April 19.

The police are claiming that he suffered the injury in the van on the way to the station, but in the same video where he can be heard screaming during the arrest, the police have to drag him to the van.

At that point, Gray's legs seem to be those of a rag doll's, loose and uncontrolled. The woman who shot the video of the arrest can also be heard exclaiming about the state of his legs, which seemed to resemble the legs of someone who had been paralyzed.