Jacob Blake’s Spinal Cord Severed

Jacob Blake, the Black Kenosha resident who was shot seven times by local police, has a severed spinal cord and may never walk again, his family members say and several other organs have been damaged, as Chicago CBS has reported.

“His family believe in miracles, but the medical diagnosis right now is that he is paralysed and, because those bullets severed his spinal cord and shattered some of his vertebrae, it is going to take a miracle for Jacob Blake Jr to ever walk again,” lawyer Ben Crump told a press conference on Tuesday, as the BBC reported.

“The 29-year-old, shot as his young sons sat in the car, was also left with holes in his stomach, an arm injury and damage to his kidney and liver,” the story noted. “Most of his colon and small intestine had to be removed, his lawyers told reporters.”

Because of the severed spinal cord, Blake is paralysed, with doctors unsure if he will ever recover the use of his legs.

His attorneys said Blake was rushed into surgery just before they spoke on Tuesday afternoon, as NBC Chicago reported. “He’s in surgery now and it won’t be his last surgery,” said Attorney Patrick Salvi Jr.

“They shot my son seven times – seven times, like he didn’t matter,” said Jacob Blake Sr. “But my son matters. He’s a human being and he matters.”

Police have said they were responding to a domestic incident when they went to the site where Blake was shot. But much of what happened is still unknown: it is still unclear who called the police, how many officers were involved, the race of the officers and what happened before the shooting.

Lawyers representing Blake said he had been trying to “de-escalate a domestic incident”. Witnesses also said this to local media.

“Court records show there was an open arrest warrant against Mr Blake on sexual assault and domestic abuse charges but police have not said if officers were aware of this when they responded to the call on Sunday,” the BBC reported.

Wisconsin’s Department of Justice is investigating the incident, and the police officers involved have been placed on administrative leave.

“The family made clear that Blake does not know what led up to his injuries, nor what happened in the aftermath in the last 48 hours,” CBS Chicago reported.

The family is filing a civil lawsuit both to demand action against the officers and help with Blake’s outstanding medical bills. “That type of rehabilitation and recovery, it’s not free,” Salvi said.

Crump told the media said there will be a march on Washington this week, to which the families of Blake, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and other victims of police shootings have been invited. The goal of the march is to “change the culture and the behavior of the policing in America before we have another Black person killed unjustifiably,” he said.