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back<\/span><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n by: Carey Wedler<\/p>\n Following the Sunday shooting of a veteran with PTSD, Johnathan Guillory, the victim\u2019s widow, the media, police and government are offering different stories.<\/p>\n his much is confirmed:<\/p>\n Guillory had done a tour in Iraq and worked as a private contractor in Afghanistan. As a result, he suffered severe PTSD. As his wife, Maria Garcia said<\/a>\u00a0of him before he went to Iraq:<\/p>\n \u201cHe was the life of the party what he wanted was to smile, have fun, you name it.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n But after his military service,<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a whole other person, I have been with him for 11 years, he was not the same.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n She explained<\/a> that<\/p>\n \u201cSometimes he couldn\u2019t even deal with day-to-day life. It was a struggle for him to get through each morning, but he did.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The couple has two children and Garcia says he wanted to get better for them. But he often encountered difficulties. She says that he called the Veteran\u2019s Association for help but was turned away and told to make an appointment, instead. Garcia told local CBS<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI think the system failed him. It was a huge disappointment for him to come in and have doctors say they couldn\u2019t fit him in an emergency appointment, that they didn\u2019t have anything, that they were totally booked up.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n In the midst of his suffering, he often went on aggressive rampages on his street that scared his neighbors. Police had previously been called to the area to investigate disturbances.<\/p>\n Resident Janet Schafer, who lives four doors down, said<\/a>,<\/p>\n \u201cMy sister-in-law had an encounter with him\u2026He was very belligerent, foul language, very agitated.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Kathy Bullion said<\/a>,<\/p>\n \u201cWe just moved in a couple weeks ago and the last few days he\u2019s been harassing us\u2026The cops have been called, they drive by all the time, and he was blaming us.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Police responded on Sunday after several 911 hang up calls were made from the Guillory residence. Garcia was not home at the time of the incident.<\/p>\n According to some news outlets, police claim Guillory was armed with a gun and they feared for their lives<\/a>. That\u2019s when two officers, Joshua Hawksworth and Sergeant Leonard Perez, opened fire on him. He died at the hospital and\u00a0the two officers are on paid administrative leave.<\/p>\n A\u00a0local ABC report<\/a>\u00a0said police explicitly claimed he was armed. The headline claims<\/a> Garcia said he had a gun, but this is not mentioned in the article. In another article<\/a>, Garcia says she did not believe he had a gun on him. CBS says he was armed<\/a> and quoted police as saying that he pointed his gun at them, that<\/p>\n \u201c\u2026the officers[,] fearing for their safety and the safety of the community fired on Mr. Guillory as trained to do\u2026As of yet [there is] no information on shots fired from anyone other than our officers.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The Arizona Department of Public Safety is refusing to say<\/a> whether or not Guillory was armed, but it seems apparent in\u00a0all coverage that if he was, he did not fire. More details will likely emerge as the investigation progresses.<\/p>\n What is clear, regardless, is the tendency of police to use fatal gunshots to stop people they feel threatened by. Rather than shooting the hypothetically armed Guillory in the leg or tasering him to debilitate him, they opted to open fire and shoot the man to death.<\/p>\n Though his famly does not blame police for what happened, one family member said<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cHe did not deserve to die, he was on his knees begging for help, and called every crisis center, suicide hotline, VA counseling every day this week trying to get some help.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n This story unfortunately represents the intersection of several ills in America: Guillory, like many soldiers, was traumatized by what he did and saw while fighting for the war machine. \u00a0He sought help from the Veterans Assocation and was turned away because of systemic failures within that system. He was then shot by police, who have \u201cbenefited\u201d from military equipment donated by\u00a0the agency Guillory \u201cserved\u201d and the mentality that they are warriors. Maricopa County police are notorious<\/a> for abusing their authority<\/a>.<\/p>\n All of these factors led to the death of Jonathan Guillory. While he may have been disturbed, he should not have died because he could not handle the trauma he suffered while serving the state that killed him.<\/p>\n As his widow said<\/a>,<\/p>\n