The family of a twin boy shot and killed by California police officers is searching for answers about why they had to kill a man in a wheelchair — while his ex-wife said the incident The video for “Broken Me.”
Anthony Lowe Jr., 36, stabbed a man in Huntington Park on Jan. 26 and was wielding a butcher knife when police shot him about 10 times after he jumped out of a chair, authorities said.
Police said an officer fired because he feared Lowe was going to throw a large knife at him.
“I just want the truth,” his mother, Dorothy Lowe, told reporters Monday. The Los Angeles Times reported.. “Nothing but truth and justice for my son. My son has been murdered.”
He added: “Anthony was a good person. He was always there for his family. He was our protector.”
Lou’s teenage son and daughter stood beside their grandmother with their heads bowed and holding pictures of their late father.
“I want to get the truth and justice, because if someone else had shot Anthony, a disabled person with him, they would be in prison for murder,” said Ebonique Simon, the mother of Lou’s son. said, NBC News reported.
“They will not be out on leave with pay,” he added.
Lowe’s older sister, Yatoya Toye, said his legs were amputated last year after an altercation with police in Texas.
Meanwhile, Lowe’s ex-wife Myesha Simpson-Lowe, 39, said she was struggling to cope with her disability when he was killed. The Daily Mail reported.
“Watching the video broke my heart. I’m sorry … he was helpless. He was not a threat. He couldn’t do anything. He was trying to get away,” Simpson Lowe told the news outlet.
“I just want justice, please. The fact that this is a man who is basically the size of a child. What was that threat? What was that threat?” Simpson Lowe said.
“Anything for them to do, it could be done in a non-lethal way. What happened to the rubber bullets? What happened to the bean bags they used to shoot? He continued.
“Tablets? It wasn’t necessary. I want to sue these cops,” added the woman, who divorced Lowe in 2021.
The L.A. County Sheriff’s Department’s Homicide Unit is investigating the incident, as is typical of shootings involving Huntington Park police officers, Lt. Hugo Renaga of the unit told the LA Times.
The unidentified Huntington Park officers involved in the shooting have been placed on paid administrative leave.
Grainy cell phone video shared online shows him hopping along the sidewalk leaving his wheelchair behind, followed by police officers with their guns drawn. The footage does not show the shooting.
Huntington Park police said police responded to a report of a stabbing victim, who suffered lung and internal bleeding while being attacked by a black man in a wheelchair.
“The suspect got out of his wheelchair, ran up to the victim without provocation, and stabbed him in the side of the chest with a 12” butcher knife, police said in the statement. “The suspect then ran back to the wheelchair and fled the scene in the wheelchair.”
Lowe ignored police commands as he “threw or threatened to throw a knife” at the officers, who then tasered him, the statement said.
When that didn’t work, they shot him and he died on the sidewalk, police said.
Ed Obayashi, an expert on use-of-force investigations, said that in order to justify a shooting, police must show they faced an immediate threat and considered reasonable alternatives, such as a Taser.
“But here we see an individual who, by definition, is incapable of physically resisting officers,” He told NBC News.
“Even if he is armed with a knife, his movement is severely restricted,” he said. “He’s an amputee. He appears to be at a certain physical disadvantage, reducing the apparent threat to the officers.”
Toy said his brother was afraid of the police and probably tried to run like Kenan Anderson, a black man who yelled, “They’re trying George Floyd for me!” During a standoff with Los Angeles police last month.
“The killing of George Floyd really affected him,” Toye said of Lowe, NBC reported. “It was because of all the police brutality that he ran. He was afraid for his life. He was terrified.”
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