16-Year-Old Unarmed Teen Gunned Down While Parents Beg Them Not To Shoot

 

16-Year-Old Unarmed Teen Gunned Down While Parents Beg Them Not To Shoot. In what is seeming to be an unending barrage of police brutality reports, another victim has surfaced in the media. This time it was an 18-year-old unarmed teen that was gunned down by police in Ottawa, Kansas on Saturday night.
The police were responding to a report of a person armed with a gun, but, once again, the person that the police killed,according to family, was not only unarmed, but also mentally ill.

18-year-old Joseph Jennings was described by his family as a “really good boy,” but they noted that he suffered from depression, anxiety and had been suffering from horrible seizures when led him to become suicidal. In fact, just two days before he was gunned down, Jennings had attempted to take his own life. He posted this statement to Facebook just before ingesting 60 pills, “Tonight is the night goodbye everyone!!!!! It was truly a good ride! And I’m sorry for who I might of hurted (sic) and people that I may of offended, But I love all my family and I hope you don’t hold this against me.”

Jennings survived the attempted overdose and coincidentally the two officers involved in the shooting of Jennings were also present when he was taken to Ransom Memorial Hospital for the overdose. Only three hours after being released from the hospital, Jennings walked over to Orschein Farm & Home where the incident took place. Jennings Aunt Brandy Smith said that he went over there on a suicide mission and when she saw how the officers were handling the situation she immediately tried to talk to the officers and intervene. “I told them it’s Joseph Jennings. He is suicidal, he is upset, don’t shoot him,” Smith said. “My husband was going to tackle him (Jennings). He was within arms reach. They said to get back or they were going to shoot him.”

Once Smith’s husband backed off the police’s attention went back to Jennings. “The cop yelled out, ‘bag him,’ and then three shots were fired with the bags. I just don’t know how many shots were fired after that. They shot him in the back of the leg and the back of the shoulder,” Smith said. Overall the teen was shot at least 16 times. Once again he was not armed and was suicidal, which the cops that were present should have known. Share this and help stop police brutality. Make cops accountable for use of excessive force. No cop should open fire on an unarmed civilian.