Deja Stallings, the 25-year-old Black woman who was pinned to the ground under an officer’s knee during her arrest last month in Kansas City, has given birth to a baby who is currently being kept in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, according to her attorney Stacy Shaw.
Shaw posted on Twitter Friday, announcing that Stallings had given birth to a baby girl, and asking for people to pray for the mother and child. Shaw also told The Kansas City Star that the baby was born two weeks early and has an elevated heart rate. Stallings had an emergency C-section on Wednesday.
Shaw said Stallings has had to go to the hospital three times since white Kansas City Police Department officer Blayne Newton knelt on her back with her belly pinned to the ground on Sept. 30. Officers initially responded to a call from a security guard who reported that a fight had broken out in the parking lot of a gas station.
Police said Stallings interfered as they tried to arrest local activist Troy Robertson, and grabbed an officer while trying to pull Robertson away.
Footage of the arrest shows Newton kneeling on Stallings’ back as he places her in handcuffs. The arrest sparked outrage and protests, as people called for KCPD Chief Richard Smith to resign.
“The People’s City,” a movement formed in response to the arrest, has seen dozens of people occupy the lawn of City Hall for several weeks.
The Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office is reviewing the arrest and will make recommendations to have arrest protocols changed if they deem it necessary.
Shaw said on Twitter that Newton’s former high-school classmates described accounts of him being “a racist and a bully.” She also noted that Newton killed an unarmed Black man named Donnie Sanders in March.
Sanders was shot on March 12 by an officer who thought he was unarmed, but it was revealed that he did not have a weapon. The case is currently under review by Missouri State Highway Patrol.
