Two Buffalo police officers who were seen on video shoving an elderly man to the ground during Black Lives Matter protest in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd, have been cleared of any wrongdoing.
The officers, Aaron Torgalski and Robert McCabe were seen on video shoving 75-year-old Martin Gugino during a protest in Niagara Square, Buffalo in June 2020. The incident happened while officers were trying to clear demonstrators for an 8 p.m. curfew.
After he was shoved, Gugino stumbled backwards and fell, hitting his head on the sidewalk and immediately started bleeding from the back of his skull and ears. Gugino spent a month in the hospital recovering from a fractured skull and brain injury.
On Friday, an arbitrator ruled that the two police officers didn’t violate the department’s use-of-force guidelines and therefore won’t face any charges over the incident.
“Upon review, there is no evidence to sustain any claim that Respondents (police officers) had any other viable options other than to move Gugino out of the way of their forward movement,” arbitrator Jeffrey Selchick wrote, according to NBC News.
Since Gugino refused to comply with orders to leave the scene and was acting erratically, and walked directly in front of McCabe, the level of force used by the officers was justified, according to Selchick.
“Gugino, after the force was applied to him, appears to have not been able to keep his balance for reasons that might well have had as much to do with the fact that he was holding objects in each hand or his advanced age,” Selchick said.
The officers were suspended without pay and arrested days after the incident on second-degree assault charges. However, a grand jury declined to indict them last year and the charges were dropped.
Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia told Buffalo News that both officers will be reinstated on Monday.
