*Trigger warning for descriptions and images related to extreme prisoner abuse*
It’s still not clear what exactly happened to Ernest Atencio, but we do know that just days after the Department of Justice accused of Sheriff Joe Arpaio “unconstitutional policing” and creating a “pervasive culture of bias” against Latinos, a 44-year-old Latino man, Ernest “Marty” Atencio, became unconscious while in one of Arpaio’s prisons, and is now brain dead and on life support. We know that Atencio got into a fight with the officers in jail and that he was put into a “safe cell.” He was found unconscious and taken to the hospital where he was declared brain dead. The family claims Atencio, who is mentally ill and a veteran of the first Gulf War, was tasered. Atencio’s brother Mike, acting as the family spokesman, said ”The sheriff’s office murdered my brother….That’s what I want to get out to the public right now:Sheriff Joe is murdering inmates.”
read rest of the post on feministing