© Sarah Cole/Paul Huggins
An elderly man was recently visiting Alabama from India when he found himself beaten by police who left him paralyzed.
Madison, Alabama police brutalized the 57-year-old Indian citizen who had committed no crime, he was only going for a walk on the sidewalk outside of his son's home. Now, one officer is being charged for leaving Sureshbhai Patel
temporarily paralyzed and hospitalized with fused vertebrae, as a result of the severe beating he received from the police.
"He was just walking on the sidewalk as he does all the time," Chirag Patel, the son of Sureshbhai said. "They put him to the ground." No crime had been committed. Madison Police on Monday issued a statement saying the department had suspended the officer and were investigating the use of force in this case. The police statement wished the man a "speedy recovery."
Chirag Patel is an engineer who had just flown his father to America from the small Indian town of Pij. Sureshbhai Patel was trying to help his wife care for Chirag's 17-month-old son, so that Chirag could finish graduate courses for his masters degree in electrical engineering at the University of Alabama. "This is a good neighborhood. I didn't expect anything to happen," Chirag said.
Madison police blamed the elderly man in a statement Monday, saying that they received a call that a man was "looking in garages." "The caller, who lives in the neighborhood did not recognize the subject and thought him to be suspicious," the police statement on the incident stated.
Hank Sherrod, the attorney for the Patel family, said "this is broad daylight, walking down the street. There is nothing suspicious about Mr. Patel other than he has brown skin." Sureshbhai Patel speaks no English. The Madison police acknowledge a "communication barrier." Sherrod explains, however, that Sureshbhai told the police officers "no English" and told them his son's address. But that didn't stop the officers from beating the man to the point of paralysis.
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