Police body-camera footage shows a Buckeye police officer detaining a 14-year-old boy with autism after he became suspicious of the boy, who was practicing one of his calming techniques at the time.

The Buckeye Police Department has said they think the officer reacted to a reasonable suspicion, but the family’s attorney says there is insufficient training for officers to deal with people on the autism spectrum, something the boy’s family would like addressed.

The footage, which the family attorney posted on YouTube Sunday, shows an officer exiting his vehicle to approach the boy near Verrado Town Square and ask him what he’s doing. The boy says he’s “stimming” and holds up a piece of string. 

Stimming,” short for self-stimulating activity, is common among people with autism. Many say they use stimming activities to help calm their nerves.

The officer asks if the boy has an ID on him, the boy says no and turns to walk away.

When the boy turns to leave, the officer grabs the boy’s arms and holds them behind his back. The encounter resulted in the officer holding the boy down on the ground as the boy yells, “I’m OK.”

Officer David Grossman, who is trained in drug recognition, was the officer involved in the detainment, according to Buckeye police, which released the video Monday.

In his police report about the July 19 incident, Grossman said he believed the teen was using an inhalant drug.

“I observed some object in his right hand that he hit against his left palm and then immediately bring his hands up to his face in what appeared he was smelling something,” he said in the report.

Grossman said he has responded to a number of drug calls in the area in the past, which, to him, justified his suspicions, the report said.

The Buckeye Police Department said Monday his response was a reasonable suspicion based on Grossman’s training and expertise.

In a briefing to the media on Monday, Buckeye Detective Tamela Skaggs, a department spokeswoman, said the department is using this incident as a learning experience officials hope to use for future training.

“We will take any type of training from this incident or any other incident to learn from and better ourselves,” Skaggs said.

She said the department is planning to start a voluntary database where anyone in the community who has a a condition that police may not be familiar with can provide their photo along with some information and any triggers they may have. This information will appear if police run the individual’s name.

Skaggs said the department also is considering implementing a system that would allow people with disabilities to wear different-colored bracelets so they are more easily identifiable by police.

Timothy Scott, the family’s attorney, said he thinks the incident “clearly shows” there has not been any training for Buckeye police officers to identify people with disabilities.

“I think it is a recurring problem generally that police officers need to do a better job of differentiating the autistic community and people under the influence of drugs,” Scott said. “I think that there’s a clear need for more training and supervision.”

Scott said that, while the teen is doing OK now, he is very afraid of police.

“One of the heartbreaking aspects of this story is that the family has always taught him to trust the police and to reach out to them if he needs help,” Scott said. “But today he is fearful of the police and that is something that is going to take a lot of hard work and treatment to overcome.”

Scott said the family has not yet filed a notice of claim with the city, which often is a pre-cursor to a lawsuit. The family hopes to avoid court, he said.

He said the family wants financial compensation to cover the teen’s therapy and treatments after this, but they are willing to handle that out of court if the department also agrees to a short list of additional requests.

“The family is asking for three things to help seek justice,” Scott said. “First, a personal apology from the officer; second, that the officer perform community service with the autistic community; and third, that Buckeye institute a mandatory training program to prevent an incident like this from ever happening again.”

The family wants to expose the entire police department, but specifically Grossman, to the autistic community.

Scott said he hopes this exposure will help Grossman understand the struggles people with autism deal with every day and hopefully learn to differentiate them from people under the influence of drugs.

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