Ft. Wayne MarketIndiana NewsLocal News

Protester loses eye after being hit in face with tear gas

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WOWO): Fort Wayne police say the moment where a protester being hit in the face with a tear gas canister, causing him to lose his right eye, was accidental.

21-year-old Balin Brake shared photos on Twitter of the aftermath, saying police “unnecessarily and improperly” fired at him during weekend protests that turned chaotic and violent. He told our Partners in News at ABC 21 that he underwent emergency surgery, but added in a follow-up tweet that he lost the eye.

The FWPD says the canister bounced up into his face as Brake was bending down to pick up another canister and throw it back at police. The department’s full statement is as follows:

“According to our officers on the ground, the protester was still in the area after commands to leave the area were given. Gas was deployed in the area and the protester bent over to pick up the canister to throw it back at officers as many others were trying to do. When he bent over another canister was deployed in the area and that canister skipped and hit the protester in the eye. There was no deliberate deployment of gas to any person’s head.”

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12 comments

James Brown June 1, 2020 at 6:49 am

Asked to leave area, did not comply. Bending over to throw back a canister already deployed on the ground, that is an act of violence in and of itself. When blacks and people of color realize that the Liberal Democrats of this country are NOT looking out for them, they will soon be on a path of freedom.

These are some direct Malcolm X quotes about the Democrats and liberals.

1. The white liberal is the worst enemy to America, and the worst enemy to the black man.

2. The liberal is more deceitful than the conservative.

3. The liberal is more hypocritical than the conservative.

4. Liberal is a nasty name.

5. Liberal represent hypocrisy.

6. That white person that you see calling himself a liberal is the most dangerous thing in the Western hemisphere, he’s the most deceitful.

7. The white liberals are nothing but political hypocrites who use our people as political footballs only to get bills passed that will increase their own power.

8. If the Negro wasn’t taken, tricked, or deceived by the white liberal then Negros would get together and solve our own problems.

9. The worst enemy that the Negro have is this white man that runs around here drooling at the mouth professing to love Negros, and calling himself a liberal, and it is following these white liberals that has perpetuated problems that Negros have.

10. The white liberal is the one who has perfected the art of posing as the Negro’s friend and benefactor; and by winning the friendship, allegiance, and support of the Negro, the white liberal is able to use the Negro as a pawn or tool in this political football game.

11. Most black leaders are puppets for the white liberals.

12. In deceiving and exploiting the politics of the American Negro, those white liberals have the willing cooperation of the Negro civil rights leaders. Those “leaders sell out our people for just a few crumbs of token recognition and token gains.

13. The white liberals control the Negroes and the Negro vote by controlling the Negro civil rights leaders.

14. The Democrats get Negro support, yet the Negroes get nothing in return.

15. The Negroes put the Democrats first, yet the Democrats put the Negroes last.

16. It was the 80 percent support that Kennedy got from the black man in this country that enabled him to sit in the White House. He sat down there four years and the Negro is still in the dog house.

17. John F Kennedy promised all of the so called American Negros who vote what he would going to do for them when he got into office, and has yet to do the first thing that he promised.

18. Kennedy has paid off the Negro leadership so that they are silent and say nothing about the promises that he made to get Negros to vote for him.

19. The Negro vote helped put the Democrats in the white house and the Negro is still in the dog house.

20. The present Democratic administration has been down there for four years, yet no meaningful legislation has been passed by them that’s supposed to benefit black people in this country.

21. The Democrats control two-thirds of the government and it’s the Negro who put him in position to control the government yet they give the Negro nothing in return.

22. In Washington D.C., in the House of Representatives, there are 257 who are Democrats; only 177 are Republican. In the Senate there are 67 Democrats; only 33 are Republicans. The Party that you backed controls two-thirds of the House of Representatives and the Senate, and still they can’t keep their promise to you,because cause you’re a chump. Anytime you throw your weight behind a political party that controls two-thirds of the government, and that Party can’t keep the promise that it made to you during election time, and you’re dumb enough to walk around continuing to identify yourself with that Party, you’re not only a chump, but you’re a traitor to your race.

23. Kennedy ran on a platform as a white liberal three years ago and said all he had to do was take out his fountain pen and put his name on some paper and our problem would be solved, and it was three years in office before he found where his fountain pen was, and the problem isn’t solved yet.

24. John Kennedy is a trickster, even if he’s the President that doesn’t stop him from being a trickster if he’s making tricks . Anytime a president a man running for President tells Negroes what he’s going to do for them when he gets in office, and after he gets in office he has time to do something for everybody else except the people that put him in office, he tricked the people who put him in office.

25. Kennedy was a deceitful man, and the only time Kennedy took any action to even look like he identified with Negroes was when he was forced to.

26. Kennedy the man was a deceiver. He was deceitful and I will never bite my tongue in saying that. I don’t think he was anything but a politician, and he used Negroes to get elected and to get votes.

27. Most politicians don’t want to wake Negroes up. They want Negroes to register and stay asleep, so they can hitch the Negro vote to their particular wagon. But you never hear any of the Negro leaders talking about waking the Negro up, make him intellectually and politically mature. They just say, “Get him to register.”And if he registers in the mental condition that he is now, any politician can come along and use him.

28. Negroes of national stature aren’t really leaders of the Negro community, and they don’t go along with anything that’s really designed to solve the problem for the Negro community. They’re controlled, their salaries are paid by what you call white liberals who are the most dangerous things in America, these things who call themselves white liberals.

29. The Democrats they got a con game going on, a political con game, and you are in the middle.

30. I’m questioning their sincerity, and some of the strategy that they’ve been using on our people by promising them promises that they don’t intend to keep.

31. This is the year of politics, this is the year when all of the white politicians are going to come into the Negro community. You never see them until election time, you can’t find them until election time. They are going to come in with false promises, and as they make these false promises they are going to feed our frustrations and this will only serve to make matters worse.

32. This government has failed the Negro. This so-called democracy has failed the Negro, and all these white liberals have definitely failed the Negro.

33. Roosevelt he could have solved many problems, and all he did was took Negroes off welfare, or first he put them onto welfare. If it hadn’t been for Hitler going on the rampage, Negroes would still be on the welfare.

34. Eleanor Roosevelt could easily have told Negroes the deceitful maneuvering of the United States government that was going on behind the scenes. She never did it. In my opinion she was just another white woman whose profession was to make it appear that she was on the Negro’s side. You have a lot of whites who are in this category. Therefore, they are made Negro loving a profession. They are what I call professional liberals who take advantage of the confidence that Negroes place in them and, therefore, this enhances their own prestige and it gives them key roles to play in the politics of this country.

35. I only cite these things to show you that in America the history of the white liberal has been nothing but a series of trickery designed to make Negros think that the white liberal was going to solve our problems. Our problems will never be solved by the white man.

These Malcolm X quotes are from his speeches called the Black Revolution, God judgement on America, The Ballot or the Bullet, Malcolm X interview at the University of California, Malcolm X interview with Austine Clarke, Malcolm X speech at Ford Hall forum 1963, Malcolm X at Columbia University, and Malcolm X interview with Robert Penn Warren.

The transcript to the Black Revolution http://malcolmxfiles.blogspot.com/2013/ … -1964.html

Jim June 24, 2020 at 9:59 pm

Malcom X must be turning in his grave with a right-wing fraud like you writing this crap.

Pat June 1, 2020 at 11:44 am

Gosh, don’t want to get hurt? Don’t participate in a riot — easy

Bolo June 1, 2020 at 12:00 pm

At least you had good time rioting. Enjoy your souvenir.

S D June 1, 2020 at 1:54 pm

Will Obamacare cover the cost of the parrot, or will he have to pay for that out of pocket? Aye, matey!

Scott M. June 1, 2020 at 6:11 pm

No sympathy! Play with fire and you’re bound to get burned! Maybe he’ll learn his lesson, though I doubt it since he blames the police for his own stupidity!

Rocky June 2, 2020 at 2:29 pm

I bet his parents are mad… Now he has even more of an excuse to never move out of the basement.

Rocky June 2, 2020 at 3:57 pm

Just an F-Y-Eye…You’re not a Protester if you are being violent and clashing with police.

b newn June 7, 2020 at 12:29 am

oh my. i’m so sad to be a hoosier after these comments . coments are angry and mean, not like hoosiers i remember.
And pray tell, why do police need tear gas in fort wayne.????
And how would this policeman know that this man was going to throw it back to the police? his story simply doesn’t make sense.
A young man loses an eye while participating in a protest and you say he deserves it! time for you commenters to read about our american revolution.

Rocky June 8, 2020 at 4:38 pm

Oh My, I’m so sad to be a Hoosier after the comment above. “coments” are written without any concept of reality. Why do Rioters need to be violent and destroy downtown when the Fort Wayne Police has such a good track record???? Why else would a rioter run to go pickup a teargas canister? His Complaints against the police doesn’t make sense. A young criminal loses an eye while committing a crime and you say we should be sympathetic! Time for you commenter to take some pills that bring you back to reality.

Brian June 13, 2020 at 8:33 pm

When he is shown on the street its his other eye. Wonder just how that happened? Surely this isn’t more fake news is it?

Darrin Wright June 15, 2020 at 4:18 am

If you look at the cut on his lip in both photos, that’s flipped as well. I would point out that when you take a picture with the “forward-facing” camera on your phone, the image can sometimes be flipped, as if you’re taking a photo using a mirror. That seems to be the case here.

Comments are closed.