(Bloomberg) -- New York Mayor Bill de Blasio called for a swift investigation into police actions that reportedly left a 16-year-old Bronx student hospitalized with a battered and bruised face during demonstrations last week.
“I want to see an investigation done in a matter of days,” de Blasio said during a news briefing Thursday.
The mayor said he'd met with the minor, Jahmel Leach, and his family Wednesday night. In a Twitter message, de Blasio shared a statement from Leach's cousin, Yamil Miller, with photographs showing the teen's face bloody, bruised and swollen. Miller said the youth had been a bystander as looting overtook the neighborhood the night of June 1, and was “shot with a taser three times in the head, leg and shoulder” and is in “danger of losing all of his teeth.”
The incident came to light as the mayor has promised reforms that would speed police disciplinary practices and make them more transparent to the public, in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd, a black man, while in Minneapolis police custody.
Police Commissioner Dermot Shea, in a Twitter-based morale-building message on Thursday to his 36,000-officer department, praised their work during the weeks of protest. At the same time, he emphasized that excessive force by a few officers has resulted in suspensions, and there may be more. He did not mention the Leach incident.
The NYPD did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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