A little over a year ago, police officers in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, shot and killed a 107-year-old man inside his residence. This past Sunday, Monroe Isadore’s family held a memorial service near his death place and they are still searching for answers.
Monroe Isadore’s youngest daughter, Paula Aquilar said she believes her father should still be alive today. The authorities never told the family why Monroe was murdered and they have yet to receive adequate answers to why police needed to kill an elderly man, whether he was armed or not.
“Why did they shoot him? Why did they not contact the family? Why did they not give him time? There’s a lot of why’s and there’s no answers to the why.” Aguilar told KATV.
This case was assigned to a special prosecutor last year, who was supposed to investigate every single factor in this case, but the officers were cleared of any wrongdoing.
“I just feel like they’re not giving enough attention. I think they’re wanting this to just go away,” Aguilar told Arkansas Matters.
Monroe Isadore was murdered last year after police responded to reports of a disturbance at his residence.
CBS News reported that when the officers arrived to Isadore’s home two people were ordered to evacuate the property, but were not harassed by the SWAT team. When the SWAT team walked through the entire house, they found 107-year-old Monroe Isadore resting in his bed. When Isadore heard the loud noise he fired a shot and officers began to panic and called for help.
When more authorities arrived to Monroe Isadore’s home, they used a camera aimed through his window to see what he was doing inside his bedroom. The police saw Isadore resting in his bed with a small handgun, and his room door was locked.
“SWAT inserted gas into the room, after it was evident negotiations were unsuccessful, in hopes Isadore would surrender peacefully. When the gas was inserted into the room, Isadore fired rounds at the SWAT officers that had inserted the gas from outside a bedroom window,” a police report from the incident reads.
“Shortly afterwards, a SWAT entry team, inside the residence, breached the door to the bedroom and threw a distraction device into the bedroom. Isadore then began to fire on the entry team and the entry team engaged Isadore, killing him,” the report says.
The family hired an attorney by the name of Lawrence Walker, and they family has agreed to file suit against the city of Pine Bluff.
“We’re hoping to get this case in front of a federal jury and get justice for the family of Monroe Isadore,” he said. “We won’t believe that a 107-year-old man needed to be gunned down when he had hearing issues that the police knew about, they knew of his age, they knew he had lots of children.”
Lawrence Walker stated the city probably won’t respond to the suit until next week.
Monroe Isadore left behind three sons, seven daughters, 66 great-grandchildren and 27 grandchildren.
