A therapist trying to calm down an autistic man was shot by police on a North Miami street on Monday—despite the fact that he was lying on the ground with his hands up. Charles Kinsey, who works at a mental health center, was trying to bring back a 23-year-old man who had wandered outside carrying a toy truck when police arrived, having received a 911 call about a man with a gun, the
Miami Herald reports. In video taken just before Kinsey, who is black, was shot in the leg, he can be seen lying down and trying to persuade the heavyset autistic man, who is still playing with the truck, to do the same. "He has a toy truck," Kinsey yells to police. "I am a behavior tech at the group home. That's all this is."
Kinsey, 47, was shot in the leg with an assault rifle. The moment doesn't appear on video released by his lawyer, though one of the people filming can be heard wondering why they "shot the black boy instead of the fat boy." "When it hit me, I'm like, 'I still got my hands in the air, and I said, 'No, I just got shot!' And I'm saying, 'Sir, why did you shoot me?' and his words to me, he said, 'I don’t know,'" Kinsey tells
WSVN. He says the worst part is that after he was shot, police handcuffed him and then left him bleeding in the street for what he estimates was 20 minutes.
NBC Miami reports that the officer involved has been placed on administrative duty while police investigate. Kinsey was hospitalized for the gunshot wound, but he could be released as soon as Thursday.