Video shows Phoenix police burning man during arrest: 'Like acid on my skin' | Arizona

On July 6, 2024, a day when temperatures reached 114 F (45.5 C) in Phoenix, Arizona, Michael Kenyon went to his local store to buy a soda when two city police officers approached him stopped.

They hastily told him he was being arrested, Kenyon recalls, without clearly stating the reason. Two more officers arrived.

Surveillance footage from across the car park, seen by the Guardian, shows the 30-year-old on the pavement moments later while several officers lay on top of him and restrained him. When they lift Kenyon from the ground after about four minutes, he appears limp.

Kenyon was badly burned on the hot city sidewalk. Medical records show he suffered third-degree burns, and photos from the hospital show deep burn scars and peeling skin all over his body. Kenyon has not been charged with any crime and a police spokesman confirmed he was not the suspect officers were seeking as part of a theft investigation.

“It felt like acid was burning my skin,” Kenyon told the Guardian. “I thought about George Floyd and didn't understand why people wouldn't help me while I was screaming in pain… like I was dying.”

This is not the first time that city residents have accused police of burning them on the sidewalk. In 2019, Phoenix police officers pinned then-18-year-old Roniah Trotter on hot asphalt on a 113°F day, leaving her with second-degree burns. Earlier this year, a 28-year-old man died in police custody after officers held him down on hot asphalt for several minutes.

For Steve Benedetto, a civil rights attorney representing Kenyon, the case shows that the Phoenix Police Department has systemic problems that require outside intervention.

In June, the U.S. Justice Department accused police of routinely discriminating against people of color and killing civilians without justification, and proposed independent oversight of police. The department has pushed back, claiming it is a “self-correcting agency” that requires no oversight. But the department came under renewed scrutiny earlier this month after footage showed two white officers repeatedly punching and using a stun gun on Tyron McAlpin, a 34-year-old deaf black man with cerebral palsy.

On the day of Kenyon's arrest, Phoenix was under an excessive heat warning, which is becoming increasingly common in the southern United States. Kenyon was wearing shorts and a tank top and was talking on the phone as police approached, according to footage from across the parking lot.

There is no audio, but the video shows two officers initially holding Kenyon by his arms and making him sit in the back of a parked truck.

The footage shows the arrival of two more officers and Kenyon landing on the sidewalk while several officers restrain him.

Grainy cell phone footage taken from above by a witness appears to show him screaming and pleading for help, at one point appearing to say: “Please… I didn't do anything.”

Once officers get Kenyon off the ground, footage shows him limping and stumbling as they walk him to a police vehicle. Kenyon said an officer eventually poured water on his burns while they waited for paramedics to arrive. He said he did not remember being transported to the hospital and may have lost consciousness, but did remember waking up handcuffed to a bed in the hospital.

Graphic photos from the hospital where he remained for weeks show burned layers of skin on his arms, legs, chest and one side of his face.

Police have not released body camera footage. A police spokesman, Rob Scherer, said in a statement that officers were investigating a “theft in progress” and that Kenyon “matched the description of the suspect.”

“Officers made contact with Kenyon and told him he was being arrested so they could understand what may have happened. The man had a fight with the police [resulted] causing him to fall to the ground on the hot asphalt. “The man suffered burns to various parts of his body from the time he was on the ground,” Scherer said. “Kenyon was determined not to be the suspect in the theft.”

He said the incident was the subject of an “ongoing criminal investigation” and an investigation by the Professional Standards Bureau, which investigates misconduct.

Kenyon said he believes one of his roommates may have called the police on another roommate because of a possible theft.

Cell phone video from one of Kenyon's roommates after the incident shows her frantically calling 911 to report what happened. “They were simply unlawfully arrested [him] … the boy you just burned,” she appears to be telling a telephone operator.

After she ended the call, the video shows her telling police at the scene that she was on the phone with Kenyon during the arrest and heard him screaming. She sobbed and pleaded with the officers to help him: “Treat him now! Treat him, treat him!” And she said to an officer, “His entire body has third-degree burns.” [They] didn’t want to let him up… I watched him get burned… If someone did something like that to your son, how would it feel?”

Dr. Cecilia Sorensen, director of the Global Consortium for Climate and Health Education in Columbia, said that when air temperatures rise above 100°F, the asphalt can sometimes be 40 to 60 degrees hotter: “When you have direct contact with that surface, that's when you start Your skin will be damaged.”

Pavement burns can occur within seconds, Dr. Rabia Nizamani, a surgeon at the Lions Burn Care Center at University Hospital in Las Vegas, added: “It takes a few minutes… to get a third-degree burn that will keep you in the hospital for weeks.” Bony parts of the body like knees are particularly at risk, and the Wounds can take months to heal, with scars affecting a patient's ability to function for years and requiring additional procedures, she said.

Kenyon said he has worked in construction, door-to-door sales and other jobs that he fears he will no longer be able to do: “I will probably never take another outside job that involves me in the field.” Sun has to work.”

He couldn't work at the moment and said a roommate was helping him with bills.

“I’m speaking out because I don’t want this to happen to other people,” he added. “I want to be the last one.” He said he doesn’t blame the individual officers. “Whoever trained these guys has a real responsibility. These guys all acted the same way, so someone drilled that into them.”

Benedetto, the lawyer, said: “A man went to the store to get a soda and then minutes later he wonders if he's going to die, and that's really typical of the situation in this department.” This is a department , who should probably do their best given the impending DoJ… These are the impacts of their policies, procedures and training that we have seen time and time again. There is never any real responsibility.”

Kenyon said he struggled to process what happened.

“I don’t really want to look at my body anymore,” he said, noting that it was too painful to see photos from the hospital. “Every time I see myself I have flashbacks. And every time I see police officers I think: Is he after me? And in my head I know it's not true, but it just comes to mind.” He said he wonders if he could have done something differently. “I have to keep telling myself that I don’t deserve this.”

He added: “I just want the Justice Department to take care of them and fix what they say they're going to fix… I'm not trying to get attention, I just want my story to be heard because I'm hurting.”