Signs of trouble before police pinned Prude naked on street
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Daniel Prude appeared to be spiraling into crisis in the hours before police handcuffed him on a city street in March, then pinned the naked man face down.
The 41- year-old had been thrown off a train the day before for disruptive behavior. He was sent to a hospital for a mental health eva lu ation after he was said to have expressed suicidal thoughts. Prude apparently stopped breathing as police in Rochester, New York, were restraining him and died when he was taken off life support a week later.
Prude's death and the actions of the police officers — who covered the man's head with a “spit hood” during the confrontation — have intensified the debate over whether police should be responding to calls about people suffering mental health crises.
Activists who have marched nightly in this city by Lake Ontario since police body camera videos of the encounter were released Wednesday say more needs to be done to hold the city accountable and to help others like Prude.
“That was a distress call for help ,” said his older brother, Joe Prude. “He wanted somebody to grab him up and help him, not sit here and mock him and taunt him, laugh at him like a piece of meat. And that's what they did.”
A union leader on Friday def ended the officers involved in the encounter, saying they were strictly following department t raining and protocols, including using the mesh hood to stop Prude from spitting.
“Tome, it looks like they were watching the training in front of them and doing step by step what the training says to do,” said Michael Mazzeo, president of the Locust Club. “If there's a problem with that, let's change it.”
Family members insisted them an seen shout in gin muffled anguish does not capture the loving one they knew.
Prude lived in Chicago, and relatives said he worked at a bakery and a factory. They said he was generous and liked playing basketball and Call of Duty. His 18-year-old daughter Tashyra Prude said he was happy the last time she saw him on March 18.
“It' s painful beyond words for people to know him as just a man on the video because there was so much more to him,” Tashyra Prude said in an interview. “The man on a video is presented as helpless and in need of support. But the man that I knew prior to that was not like that. My father was always energetic. He was happy-go-lucky. He was the person that made everybody laugh. “
Prude had been behind bars several times over the decades. Chicago Police reported 37 arrests and nine convictions since 1995, eight for drug- and alcohol- related charges and one for burglary. Police said there was nothing on his record suggesting he was particularly violent. In most of the cases, Illinois Department of Corrections records show that he was paroled out of prison after serving less than a year.