A surveillance video appears to show Phoenix police officers holding a man down on hot pavement in July heat, which caused third degree burns on his skin — though police later determined he was not the suspect they were looking for. On a day in July when temperatures in Phoenix, Arizona, reached 114F Michael Kenyon was walking to his local store to buy a soda when two officers of the city’s police department stopped him, the Guardian reports. Kenyon said the told him he was being detained, without clearly stating why. Two more officers arrived, and surveillance footage from across the parking lot, which was viewed by the Guardian, shows the 30-year-old on the pavement soon after, with several officers on top of him and holding him down. Once they lift Kenyon off the ground after roughly four minutes, he appears limp. Kenyon had been burned – severely burned – on the hot city pavement. Medical records indicate he suffered third-degree burns, and hospital photos show deep burn scars and skin peeled off across his body. Kenyon has not been charged with a crime and a police spokesperson confirmed he was not the suspect that officers were seeking as part of a theft investigation.
“It felt like acid burning my skin,” Kenyon said. “I thought of George Floyd, and I didn’t understand why people wouldn’t help me as I was screaming in pain … like I was dying.” t’s not the first time residents in the city have accused police of burning them on the pavement. In 2019, Phoenix police department officers held Roniah Trotter, then 18, on hot pavement on a 113F day, leaving her with second-degree burns. Earlier that year, a 28-year-old man died in police custody after officers held him down on hot asphalt for several minutes. “I’m speaking out because I don’t want this to happen to other people,” he added. “I want to be the last one.” He said he didn’t blame the individual officers. “Whoever trained these guys are really responsible. These guys all acted the same, so somebody drilled it into them.”
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