Three years ago, in May of 2017, 28 yr. old Tory Sanders, a Black man from Tennessee and father of 8, made a wrong turn and ended up lost in rural Missouri. He ran out of gas, and walked to Charleston, a small town in the Bootheel of Missouri, to ask for help. He called his mother and asked if she thought the police would help him, and she said, yes, of course they would. Mr. Sanders sought help from local law enforcement – twice - only to end up dead in a Missouri County jail cell eight hours later. This was simply a case of a young man needing help to get home. 
     Sanders was not put in jail because he was facing criminal charges. He was put in jail on what they called a “protective hold,” with the idea, they stated, that he might be “a danger to himself.” After being determined to be “fine” by a Mental Health professional, he continued to be held for the entire day. Because he was “getting agitated,” he was handcuffed, beaten, and tased repeatedly. Pepper spray was blasted into his cell. In an altercation just before his death, a barrage of officers rushed into his cell and tackled him in what became a dogpile. Two jail officials, one of which was the County Sheriff, reportedly pressed down on his neck for more than three minutes even as a colleague urged them repeatedly to ease up, according to a lawsuit later filed by Sanders’ family. They didn’t listen until after Sanders passed out. Many of the interactions in the jail cell were captured on surveillance film. 
     There is a long history of people being brutalized in that jail. Three other people have died being held in this jail. All while Cory Hutcheson was either Deputy or County Sheriff. At the time of Tory Sanders death, Hutcheson was out on bond for 18 criminal charges as well as civil lawsuits involving 2 of these deaths! 
Josh Hawley, who was the Missouri Attorney General at that time, declined to prosecute anyone for those actions. There is no record made of any criminal actions. No one has ever been charged for Tory Sander's death and murder. 
George Floyd and Tory Sanders deaths are tragically similar.  Both died with law enforcement’s knee literally on their neck. The only difference was Floyd was in the middle of the street, and Mr. Sanders was in a jail cell. 
     It is high time for us to join the Missouri State Conference of the NAACP and the Missouri Legislative Black Caucus to demand Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, to reopen the case and pursue a prosecution of Cory Hutcheson and the other officers involved in the murder of Tory Sanders. With the attention around the recent death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the time is NOW to bring new attention to a horrific death of another innocent Black man.  
     Tory Sanders was tortured. After he was cuffed, he was beaten, tased multiple times and pepper sprayed. Simply because he was a young man, a Black man, and because he had nobody there.  
     “He had gone out for a drive that night to clear his head,” Nimrod Chapel Jr., the President of the Missouri NAACP, explained. “Runs out of gas that night, and his life was forever changed by his interaction with law enforcement.” 
     It is high time to demand justice for Tory Sanders. 
 
Sign my petition to demand that Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt reopen Tory Sanders case and pursue prosecution for Cory Hutcheson and the other officers involved.