“There were so many police officers… why didn’t they grab her by the arm?”
The question was asked by the mother of Pamela Cisneros, the 49-year-old woman who attacked two people with two knives in Times Square and ended up dying after being shot by police.
Images from the scene show Cisneros facing several officers while still armed. According to police, they tried to convince her to drop the knives for about four minutes. They also used stun guns, but failed to stop her.
In the midst of the confrontation, Cisneros reportedly warned the officers that she would rather kill them than surrender the weapons. She then began moving toward them while holding both knives, at which point two officers opened fire. Cisneros was taken to a hospital, where she died.
Her mother, however, still does not understand why they could not physically subdue her.
“Why didn’t they grab her by the arm?”, she asked during an interview in Spanish with FOX 5.
The case is even more complex because of Cisneros’s history of mental health problems, which had been documented by authorities. Her family says she had been receiving treatment for years and that, until shortly before the attack, she appeared to be stable. Her father even said that she received medication through monthly injections.
None of this changes the tragedy that occurred in the middle of Times Square: a woman died and another person was seriously injured in an apparently random attack.
But now, in addition to trying to understand what led Cisneros to that moment, another question remains about those final minutes:
Was there another way to stop her before the officers ended up shooting her?