The mother of 28-year-old St. Louis, Missouri man Omar Rahman is furious after a photo showing an North County Cooperative officer posing with her son’s dead body giving a thumb up surfaced after an anonymous leak.
Kim Staton’s son died on Aug. 8 after an accidental drug overdose per the Medical Examiner’s ruling. In an exclusive interview with KMOV FOX 4, Staton tells reporters that she received little to no information about her son’s death.
“I really don’t know, actually, what happened to my son,” she says. “… [Police are] supposed to be there to help and protect, not doing what he was doing with thumbs up and a smirk on his face.”
However, the North County Cooperative police department has made few comments on the controversial photo released weeks after Rahman’s death. They state that the photo is “stolen property” and the “NCPC does not believe it is appropriate to comment on a matter related to 2 open criminal investigations.”
Now, Staton’s attorney Antonio Romanucci is seeking legal action in the form of a lawsuit.
“I have seen thousands and thousands of forensic photographs, I have never seen a staged photograph of an officer next to a deceased body,” Romanucci tells reporters.
Furthermore, KMOV reached out to former St. Louis Chief Dan Isom for an expert’s opinion. He says that the officer’s actions are baffling and disturbing.
“I don’t know why he’s raising his thumb in the air. I don’t know what he’s doing at that point. And I can’t explain why you would be doing that in the photo. But certainly there are reasons why a person might turn a body over, view it, for signs of trauma.”
