Rachel Kohnen screamed that she was in labor as cops forced her to the ground
There have been a lot of stories in the news lately about cops aggressively handling American citizens. Some officers are even shooting dead innocent people they suspect of low-level crimes, like Michael Brown’s shoplifting and jaywalking incident and John Crawford’s B.B. gun carrying — in a state that allows open-carry — and so when a story like this hits, it drives home the point that perhaps police officers need to be retrained on how to handle certain situations.
Early Tuesday morning in Iowa, Rachel Kohnen started to go into labor with her fourth child, but she felt like something was wrong. She described feeling as if her baby was coming immediately, and so her husband, Ben Kohnen, loaded her into the car and raced off towards the hospital.
That’s when they caught the attention of an officer, who spotted them speeding at about 85 mph in a 55 mph zone. Rachel told her husband not to stop and instead call 911 but the operator’s could not understand her, as she was screaming from the sharp contractions she was having. Her husband Ben, kept driving.
That’s when the officers threw down a tire spike strip to stop the runaways, puncturing the Kohnens tires, and approached the vehicle with guns drawn, pulling the couple out of their SUV and putting them on the ground.
In an interview given to CNN, Rachel laughed off the incident saying:
I was in the middle of the highway, having contractions, with guns pointed at me.
When the officer realized she was in labor, he escorted the couple to the hospital, where Rachel gave birth to a healthy baby girl named Hazel an hour later.
This story has a happy ending for this couple, which makes it easy to laugh off. It definitely doesn’t look like the officer did anything too wrong in this case. Judging by the recent events in this country the family is lucky to have escaped without any extra holes.
See the video of the Kohnens near arrest below:
For Sandra Amezquita last month, her visibly pregnant condition inspired no such sympathy from New York police officers who were trying to arrest her son when she felt the cops were acting too aggressively and tried to intervene. This ended with Amezquita being slammed to the ground face down. It was all caught on video by an anonymous cameraman. Amezquita does not know if any lasting harm was done to her baby, saying:
I pray to God nothing happened to him. I am praying my baby is born healthy.
When Mercedes Hildago, a friend to Amezquita, tried to intervene and warn the cops that her friend was pregnant, they also shoved her to the ground.
Now, granted, it’s never a good idea to try to stop an arrest, but Amezquita, the mother of Jhohan Lemos, 17, who was the one initially being arrested by the 72nd precinct for being suspected of carrying a knife, tried to intervene when she became afraid for her son’s life. It’s no secret that the NYPD has been cited in several incidences of police brutality, such as the case with Eric Garner, who was choked and killed for selling loose cigarettes.
The Internal Affairs Bureau (IAB) is investigating this incident and the cops were not put on administrative leave. Amezquita says she plans to sue the NYPD.
While the Kohnens are safe and happy with their perfect newborn, you have to wonder how her husband would have been treated initially had he been a person of color. Would the story have had a much sadder ending?
H/T: Huffington Post Photo: Free Thought Project
Wow,a white family gets stopped,guns drawn,and no one was shot “accidentally” or roughed up and called vile names. Even escorted to the hospital. Hummmm. The black family was trying to get to the hospital to see her dying mom before she passed away,but was not given the same courtesy. Sad,
Your grammar is horrible. Kohnen’s is singular possessive. Kohnens is the accepted plural when speaking of one or more family member. “Police shooting dead innocent people…” is an awkward sentence. It sounds better if you write Police are shooting and killing innocent people.”
Please read before posting your articles Miss Duffy.
As if your petty corrections really make a difference in the overall scheme of things. Pleas get a grip and vie the larger issue. Those errors do not devalue the post.
Francine first, two apostrophe mistakes does not constitute horrible grammar. It’s been fixed. I like my awkward sentence the way it is. If you’re such a fabulous writer, put your own hard work up on the world stage so people can rip it to shreds over insignificant things.
Seriously Ms. Price, what you got out of the article is “bad grammar”. You totally missed the point of the article. It doesn’t matter what vernacular is being used, the important thing is the message. The message is that the police are using deadly force for situations that do not call for it, and they are getting away with it. That is the important message that is trying to be conveyed here. It is not starting to transcend all races and nationalities, not just minorities. Where is it going to stop? Too many innocent lives have been lost for minor infractions. Fathers, sons, friends are being gunned down at an astronomical rate and all you can think about is the “grammar”. That is the real crime here, not seeing the forest for the trees.
See, we all make typos at times too.