US activists protest police violence after 9-year-old girl pepper-sprayed in New York

People have held a protest in the US city of Rochester, New York, against US police violence after a video emerged showing police officers pepper-spraying a handcuffed nine-year-old girl.

Protesters gathered outside the police department and called for children protection and an end to the police brutality in the US.

Black Lives Matter protesters holding flags and some with fists in air chanting “no justice, no peace.”

Police said the officers involved were responding to a family disturbance call on Friday, and video taken during the incident showed them wrestling the girl to the ground in the snow.

Police handcuffed the minor, before trying to force her into the car and pepper-spraying her when she resisted, a minute-long bodycam video showed. 

Rochester Deputy Police Chief Andre Anderson said the minor had been suffering from a serious mental health emergency, claiming the girl was suicidal and threatened to kill her mother.

Mayor Lovely Warren said, "What happened Friday was simply horrible, and has rightly outraged, all of our community. Unfortunately, (New York) state law and union contract prevents me from taking more immediate and serious action."

The Footage, which has sparked new outrage and anger over excesses committed by the US law enforcement, showed at least seven police officers were involved in the Friday incident.

Fresh outrage as US police pepper-spray handcuffed 9-year-old girl in New York

A nine-year-old Black girl has been handcuffed and pepper-sprayed by US police in the city of Rochester, New York, sparking fresh rage over US police vilence.

The officers were suspended Monday at the mayor's request. The suspension will continue until the conclusion of an internal probe by the Rochester police.

Warren said she would “lead the charge” in seeking changes to state law to allow municipal governments to take swifter action to discipline officers in such cases.

Rochester city council members condemned the violence, accusing the police of excessive force in a situation where mental health professionals should have been involved.

Local police chief Cynthia Herriott-Sullivan also acknowledged that the police had acted excessively.

"I'm not going to stand here and tell you that for a 9-year-old to have to be pepper-sprayed is OK," she said. "It's not."

But the local police union president Mike Mazzeo defended the officers' actions, saying that "limited resources" had left them no choice but to use pepper-spray against the child.

The incident is the second time in a year that Rochester has come under scrutiny for police violence, following the killing last March of Daniel Prude, who suffocated after police put a hood over his head and forced him face down on the road.

The death of Prude, an African-American man who was undergoing a mental health crisis at the time of his detention, sparked mass protests and prompted a grand jury probe.

An inquiry concluded that seven officers involved in the death of Daniel Prude, 41, acted within department policy and ethical standards.

US police violence against African-Americans, including the brutal killing of George Floyd last May, set off protests across the US against racial injustice and police brutality last year.

Press TV’s website can also be accessed at the following alternate addresses:

www.presstv.co.uk