Charleena Lyles Killed By Police While Pregnant

Charleena Lyles Killed By Police While Pregnant

Outrage is spreading and questions are arising over the death of a 30-year-old pregnant woman who called police to her home to report a home invasion.

Charleena Lyles’ reportedly called police in the early hours of Sunday morning to report an attempted burglary at her Seattle home. She was home alone with her three children at the time.

Upon their arrival, police say that Lyles brandished a knife, so they opened fire on her, shooting her dead. Her two sons and daughter were all inside the home when police shot their mother down. Thankfully, all the children were unharmed during the incident.

Lyles was reportedly three months pregnant with her fourth child when she was killed.

Lyles, whose family reports that she had a history of mental health issues, had had a recent dust-up with local police in the weeks leading up to the incident that ultimately took her life. Her family believes that this, coupled with the factor of her race, led to the cops responding to her distress call with such hostility. As Newsweek reports:

Police Detective Mark Jamieson told local media that the two officers who responded to Lyles’ call had been alerted of “hazard information” in the police database regarding a former exchange Lyles had with authorities in early June. Lyles had been previously arrested for obstruction of a public official and two counts of harassment on June 5 but had been released conditionally on June 14. During that particular altercation, Lyles was armed with a pair of scissors, according to police reports.

SMH. We’ll be following this story as it develops, but we can’t see how shooting a pregnant woman down was a justified response from police — ESPECIALLY since she was the one that called for their assistance.