Gelois Allen wants community members to remember her son Patrick Allen, who died Aug. 5 in police custody, as "a child of God" and "a human being."
As a nurse, Gelois Allen was deeply troubled by the Knoxville Police Department body camera footage that showed how police and emergency responders treated her son, a 49-year-old West High School graduate with a mental health disorder, and his rapid decline in the back of a squad car.
She remembers him as the kid who loved sports, who played baseball and soccer in high school, and was the fullback and running back for the football team. As an adult, he would come over to watch Steelers games at his mother's house, the home he was raised in from the age of 2.
Patrick Allen was a quiet kid and "a gentle
soul." His mother brought him up in the church. In his final moments in the squad car outside the convenience store, he called on his faith, saying, "Come down, Jesus."
He was a father of six and loved a good meal, especially one cooked up by his mom. Patrick Allen also was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. His mother was his point person, managing his finances and driving him around, although he did not live with her and sometimes didn't take his medication regularly.
"He wasn't a hostile, mean person," Gelois Allen told Knox News in an interview after her son's death. "He didn't live his life fighting, and cursing and screaming. He was a human being."
What happened Aug. 5, and what could have helped Patrick Allen
Patrick Allen lived at Cagle Terrace, an affordable housing site that's a five-minute walk from the Breadbox convenience store on Sutherland Avenue where he was arrested. He previously lived at Western Heights, another Knoxville's Community Development Corporation property that, like all city properties, screens potential residents' criminal records to decide if they're eligible.
Since moving to Cagle Terrace, he went to the Breadbox often, around three or four times a week, to buy cigarettes, soda, candy or something else to eat.
Patrick Allen's death in police custody has galvanized people who question how officers handled the encounter. A vigil organized by the City Council Movement at the City-County Building ahead of the Sept. 1 city council meeting honored his life life. Participants demanded "an end to police killings," according to a post on social media.
Watching the police body-camera and in-car footage, Gelois Allen saw officers and medical professionals treat her son "like he was a homeless Black man who didn't have any rights."
As a nurse at St. Mary's Hospital for 38 years and Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center for 14, she is appalled by the lack of care he received that day. "They didn't do basic physical things for my son," she said.
Aside from his paranoid schizophrenia, Gelois Allen told Knox News her son did not have other preexisting health conditions. She thinks officers at the scene are responsible for his change in condition.
For anyone with medical experience, or even without, Patrick Allen clearly was in respiratory distress, his mom said, and no one moved with urgency to respond. Gelois Allen believes that inaction was a death sentence for him.
"They let my son die," she said.
Gelois Allen also is frustrated that, in her eyes, the police department should know how to work with people who have mental illness. "I didn't see that happen," she said.
Knox News asked KPD spokesperson Scott Erland why the Co-Responder Program, a partnership with KPD and the McNabb Center that pairs a crisis intervention-trained police officer and mental health clinician to respond to some calls together, was not used.
Erland told Knox News the office of professional standards hasn't yet interviewed the officers to understand why they didn't use the program, but based on a preliminary review it doesn't seem to qualify as co-responder call. He said that's because it was "criminal in nature from the beginning" because the Breadbox workers said Patrick Allen was trespassing, and co-responder teams are for calls regarding "individuals experiencing behavioral health or substance abuse crises."
No autopsy had been completed as of Sept. 1. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is investigating the police response, which is standard practice. The three officers − Lucas Cunningham, Riley Lackey and John Hart − were placed on routine paid leave after Patrick Allen's death and have resumed their normal duties, Erland said.
The day Patrick Allen died
On Aug. 19, KPD released the video that shows some of what transpired at the Breadbox the day Patrick Allen died, starting when police officers arrived at the store at 2:30 p.m.
A store employee tells Cunningham his manager told him to call and that Allen was not allowed in the store. In the parking lot, he insists to the officer that he is the store owner.
Allen cooperates by giving his name, identification, address and date of birth. Gelois Allen noted during the interview with Knox News she often discussed with her children "what they should do and what they shouldn't do as Black men."
When Lackey arrives, Cunningham tells him Allen is trespassing, but does not directly address Allen's questions about what's happening. Physical contact ensues after that, and it is not clear from the video who initiates it. The officers ultimately bring him to the ground and he can be heard saying, "no," "I'm sorry" and "they're violating me."
The two officers, along with the store employee, hold Patrick down. More police arrive and continue to restrain him while he is handcuffed. Lackey observes Allen's labored breath, and asks, "Still breathing for me, Pat?" Around 10 minutes after Patrick first hit the ground, Lackey asks when the ambulance might arrive and says they could take Allen somewhere for medical assistance themselves.
Allen is then assisted into the cruiser, where officers check on him intermittently. When an emergency responder speaks with Allen, he's able to say his name and the year, but shortly after, he stops responding. The officers and emergency responders try unsuccessfully to get him to speak.
An emergency responder does a sternum rub, meant to check a person's consciousness. Three minutes after Allen stops responding, he's placed on a stretcher. "He's not breathing," one of the emergency responders says.
By the time he's brought into the ambulance, five minutes have passed since he was last responsive. That's where CPR was administered, according to a release from KPD. Allen was taken to the University of Tennessee Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.
Gelois Allen was notified of her son's death the following day, she said.
"He didn't want to hurt anybody else. And he didn't need to be hurt himself."
Hayden Dunbar Evans is the storyteller reporter. Email: hayden.dunbar@knoxnews.com. Instagram: @knoxstoryteller.
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This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Mom of man who died in custody wants him remembered as 'a child of God'
