New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman announced Monday that he’s using his new power as a special prosecutor to investigate the death of a woman who died in police custody last week.
Raynette Turner of Mount Vernon, N.Y., was the fifth African-American woman in the country known to have died in police custody in the month of July.
Authorities say the 42-year-old Turner died two days after her arrest on a shoplifting charge.
The Journal News reported that Turner had said she wasn’t feeling well the night before her death. She was taken by ambulance to a hospital. She was then returned to her cell that same night, and taken to a court holding area the next morning, where she again complained she was not feeling well. She was then returned to a police-controlled holding cell where, at 2 p.m. last Monday, she was found dead.
It’s the first case Schneiderman has taken on since Governor Andrew Cuomo gave him the authority to investigate when people die in encounters with police.
This report contains information from the Associated Press.
