Despite safety warnings, police departments continue misapplying restraint positions and techniques
Two officers stood on Fernando Rodriguez’s outstretched arms, handcuffs connecting his wrists. Another stood on the shackles binding the 24-year-old’s legs. A fourth officer kneeled on Rodriguez’s back. The fifth placed his weight on the man’s buttocks.
Five officers from the Hampton city and Henry County police departments in Georgia subdued Rodriguez late on Sept. 20, 2019, after receiving multiple calls about a nude man walking down a blacktop road. The details of what happened are revealed in court documents, police and autopsy reports and officer body-camera footage reviewed by the Howard Center for Investigative Journalism at Arizona State University.
Police accounts describe a violent struggle with Rodriguez, who was reported acting erratically and possibly on drugs, involving at least nine Taser shocks. Body-camera video and audio paint a fuller picture of what happened, including that Rodriguez was shocked at least 16 times during the incident.