Manslaughter charges dropped in a man's death at a psychiatric hospital
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[November 05, 2024]
By OLIVIA DIAZ
RICHMOND,
Va. (AP) — A Virginia judge has signed off on a prosecutor’s request to
withdraw charges against two people charged in the 2023 death of Irvo
Otieno, a young man who was pinned to the floor for about 11 minutes
while being admitted to a state psychiatric hospital.
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Caroline Ouko, mother of Irvo Otieno, holds a portrait of her son
accompanied by attorney Ben Crump, left, and her older son, Leon Ochieng
at the Dinwiddie Courthouse in Dinwiddie, Va., on Thursday, March 16,
2023. (Daniel Sangjib Min/Richmond Times-Dispatch via AP, File) |
Dinwiddie Circuit Court Chief Judge Joseph M. Teefey Jr.
approved prosecutors' motions on Friday to drop involuntary
manslaughter charges against Kaiyell Sanders and Brandon
Rodgers, two Henrico County Sheriff’s deputies charged in
Otieno's death.
“We knew the evidence and we knew the evidence didn’t support
the actions claimed,” said W. Edward Riley, an attorney
representing Sanders said Monday.
Otieno, a 28-year-old Black man, had been taken into custody at
a state psychiatric hospital amid a mental health crisis.
Hospital video captured a scrum of deputies and hospital workers
restraining Otieno while he was in handcuffs and leg shackles.
He died of what a medical examiner found was “positional and
mechanical asphyxia with restraints.”
Otieno's death gained national attention and sparked public
outcry. Caroline Ouko, Otieno’s mother, had previously said her
son, a hip-hop songwriter, deserved justice.
“When they took my baby away ... they took him away from his
brother,” she said. They took him away from his nieces. They
took him away from his friends.”
At the time, prosecutors obtained an indictment charging 10
defendants with second-degree murder, but three months later
dropped two defendant’s charges. A year after that, officials
dropped the charges of five more defendants in the case.
Prosecutors maintained charges against Rodgers, Sanders and
Wavie Jones, a security staffer at the hospital, but downgraded
the charges to involuntary manslaughter.
A jury found Jones not guilty in October.
The local Commonwealth’s attorney said in a Monday statement
that she had reevaluated the evidence after Jones’ acquittal,
and was compelled to drop the remaining charges.
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