NYPD investigating allegations cops bloodied Bronx teenager
The NYPD is looking into allegations that officers bloodied a Bronx teenager and took him into custody without ever alerting his family, the mayor said Wednesday night.
Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a tweet that he has spoken to the family of the alleged victim, 16-year-old Jahmel Leach, and he came away “really troubled by what they told me.”
“We’re going to get them answers,” he wrote. “The NYPD has launched an investigation into what happened.”
Hizzoner also shared a tweet that included a statement and gruesome images of the boy in a hospital gown with the right side of his face bruised and bloody.
The statement, from Jahmel’s cousin, Yamil Miller, said that on June 1, officers shot the minor with a taser three times in the head, leg and shoulder, and that he now risks losing all of his teeth.
The alleged incident occurred on a night of rampant rioting and looting in Fordham, where dozens of fires were lit.
A police source said Leach was tased after allegedly trying to set a fire in the area, taken into custody and charged with arson. He was also allegedly seen running in and out of a looted T-Mobile store, the source said.
The family denied that the teen took part in the riots, writing in the statement: “Jahmel Leach was not involved in any acts of violence.”
Cops held the teen “against his will and legal right” and his mother was “never notified that he was in police custody,” his cousin, Miller, wrote.
A cop involved in the incident allegedly told the boy’s mother, “I’m sorry he is so tall I thought he was an adult when I took him down,” the statement says.
The family is “traumatized by this encounter” and demanding action from legislators.
“Jahmel is recovering but certainly in shock,” Miller told The Post.
The mayor appears to have met the teen at a rally in Brooklyn last week, according to a post on Miller’s Instagram account.
“Discussing EXCESSIVE FORCE with Mayor DiBlasio. JAHMEL wanted to tell his story,” the caption reads.
The NYPD confirmed in a statement that “the matter is under internal review.”