Racial justice protestors at a rally in Woods Hole in 2020.
Today marks one year since the police murder of George Floyd, which sparked protests around the world and spurred a new wave of activism.
To reflect on the past year, CAI talked with people in our region about how Floyd’s death touched their lives and prompted action.
Robert Cutts grew up in Harwich and returned to the Cape to retire.
When he worked as a deputy sheriff in Virginia, he went public with complaints of racism in his own department, but he still believes most police officers want to do the right thing.
A federal lawsuit filed this week alleges that on the night of April 16, 2019, Robert Miller lay chest-down in his Hyannis home, struggling for air, as a Barnstable police officer applied pressure to his back.
The officer, Sean Roycroft, had been sent to Miller’s home for what a dispatch log coded as a “mental health emergency” after his girlfriend called 911.
Miller, the lawsuit says, was suffering a psychotic break and needed help.
When Officer Spencer Jackson arrived, he struck the 63-year-old man “supposedly to assist in handcuffing him,” according to the lawsuit. By the time police put Miller in handcuffs minutes later, he had no pulse, the suit says.
By WXTK News
May 6, 2021
The family of a Cape Cod man is suing the Barnstable Police Department alleging his death was caused by excessive force.
WCVB-TV in Boston reports the civil rights lawsuit stems from the police responding to a mental health emergency at Robert Miller s Hyannis home in 2019.
The family claims responding officers forced the 63-year-old Miller chest-down onto the floor, causing him to be unable to breathe.
Spring dig, car wash, cut bait, songwriters, poets, Town Notes
The Barnstable Patriot
The 1717 Meetinghouse Foundation Trustees have been working to remedy the lack of available emergency water in West Barnstable, one of the few communities on the Cape without fire hydrants.
Seventy years ago, the efforts to restore the 1717 Meetinghouse cost approximately $1 million in today’s dollars.The end result will be 60,000 gallons of water buried underground to be used in case of fire, standing ready to preserve the building s history and memories.
The Barnstable High School Class of 2021 will be holding a Car Wash Fundraiser this weekend, Saturday and Sunday May 1 and 2, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Change of location: Moving from BIS to Steve & Sue s Par-Tee Freeze on West Main St.