Mom Says Her 13 Year Old With Asperger’s Was Unarmed When He Was Shot by Police: ‘Why Didn’t You Just Tackle Him?’

A Salt Lake City mother called police after her 13-year old son who has Asperger syndrome was experiencing a mental crisis. She says she told police he was unarmed, asked for a Crisis Intervention Team, and she just needed help calming him down so he could be taken to a hospital.

“I said, ‘He’s unarmed. He doesn’t have anything. He just gets mad and he starts yelling and screaming,’” Golda Barton said, according to The Washington Post. “He’s a kid. He’s trying to get attention. He doesn’t know how to regulate.”

“He’s a small child. Why didn’t you just tackle him?” Barton told KUTV on Sunday (video below.) “He’s a baby. He has mental issues.”

Barton’s son, Linden Cameron suffered “injuries to his shoulder, both ankles, intestines, and bladder, according to his mother, the Salt Lake City TV station reports.

“She said in less than five minutes, she heard ‘get down on the ground’ and several gunshots were heard.”

She says her expectation is that police are “supposed to come out and be able to deescalate a situation using the most minimal force possible.”

It was Barton’s first day back to work in a year, she said, and her son, Linden, “has bad separation anxiety.”

KUTV reports “SLCPD said police were called to the area for a report of a ‘violent psych issue’ involving the juvenile ‘having a mental episode’ and ‘making threats to some folks with a weapon.'”

Police found no weapon, and Barton says she told them her son was not armed.

The shooting is under investigation.

A GoFundMe page has been set up. It says Linden ” loves video games, four wheeling, and longboarding with his older brother, and building things. He is always looking for ways to help people out. Linden is very important to his family, and his mother and brother are supporting him through his recovery.”

Image via GoFundMe