Mother of Tony Robinson: I was isolated at hospital and not told of son's death | Wisconsin
Mother of Tony Robinson: I was isolated at hospital and not told of son's death
This article is more than 8 years old- Andrea Irwin recalls ‘gut-wrenching’ wait while she ‘still had hope’
- Irwin has ‘total confidence’ in investigation into Madison police shooting
The mother of Tony Terrell Robinson Jr has spoken of the “gut-wrenching” wait in a hospital waiting room after her son was shot. “At that time, I still had hope,” Andrea Irwin told the Guardian.
Robinson was shot by police officer Matt Kenny in Madison, Wisconsin, at around 6.30pm on 6 March after an alleged altercation.
The 19-year-old, who had taken hallucinogenic mushrooms earlier in the day, had been reported jumping in and out of traffic, and a close friend had called 911 to ask police for help for Robinson.
“My son’s friend, his mother called me and told me that he was shot so I should get to the hospital,” Irwin told the Guardian. She arrived at UW medical center at around 7pm, roughly half an hour after the fatal shooting had taken place, and a hospital social worker and three police officers took her back to a family visiting room.
“I didn’t want to be [alone],” she told the Guardian. Her boyfriend had arrived at the emergency room with her and then gone to park the car. “I kept asking for my boyfriend who was in the waiting room, and they just didn’t bring him back. I didn’t know why, and I really was never told why.”
She described her state of mind as she waited for any news of her son. “Being that I knew that my son had been shot and I was waiting for any information, it was gut-wrenching, because I didn’t know what was going on, and at that time I still had hope.”
The social worker and officer blocked her exit when she tried to leave. “I did a lot of pacing in the room, she said.” She was also told not to use her cellphone. “I had to stay there until the doctor came to tell me what happened” – which took roughly 15 minutes, she said.
But it wasn’t until later in the evening, at around 9pm, that Irwin learned from a family member who had seen the evening news that Robinson had been killed by a police officer.
A Madison police department spokesman, Joel DeSpain, told the Guardian that the chief of police, Mike Koval, went to visit Robinson’s family the night of the shooting. At time of publication, police representatives were unable to answer questions about Irwin’s forced isolation and the delay in telling her her son had died.
Despite the traumatic way she learned of her son’s death, Irwin said her faith in the Department of Criminal Investigations, the body looking into the killing, was steadfast. “I have total confidence that they are going to be doing an investigation unbiased,” she said, adding that she held no “ill feelings” towards the Madison police department, and did not want to be associated with any “negativity” towards Kenny.
She did not hold “the many responsible for the actions of one”, she said. “I have no hatred, or any of that. I don’t. I want my kids to know that. Because I do think that police are necessary for us to have a civil society.”
She said she wanted to be at least as “open-minded and non-judgmental as I’m asking people to be of my son. He was a great kid. He was just loving and caring, funny, rambunctious, active, athletic.”
She said: “I miss laying my head on his chest, because I just came up to just his chest, when I hugged him, and hearing his heartbeat.”
But she said the media – traditional and social – had misrepresented her son, whom she characterises as a “gentle giant”, despite his conviction in 2014 for a home invasion. He took full responsibility for his actions in that case, Irwin said, claiming he was only an accessory. “The police officers who had arrested him spoke highly of him to the DA,” she said, while the judge rejected the district attorney’s sentencing recommendation and viewed Robinson as “a good young man who made a mistake”, his mother said.
A friend of Robinson’s has told the Guardian he was on magic mushrooms at the time of the incident, but his mother said she doubted this. “But if he had been, or if he was, and any calls were made for help for him being on substances, I believe that the police should arrive in a manner approaching it, to knowing that this person is maybe on a mind-altering substance, so that they know that they’re not going to be lucid or be able to make rational decisions.” They should have had an ambulance, or “definitely more than one officer” to approach him.
Irwin’s tragedy has drawn attention to Madison’s stark racial disparities. Black youth in Dane County, where Robinson lived, which includes the state capital, are six times more likely to be arrested than white youth, and three-quarters of the former live in poverty versus just 5% of the latter.
But support from school district members and others in her local community had helped Irwin and her three remaining children deal with losing her son and their brother.
“The police and the community, both sides are having issues of fear of each other,” Irwin said. “But if we can change that, maybe things like this won’t happen again.”
But personally she felt extremely lost. “The boy was my light. I had him young; we grew up together. He was my best friend and he’s gone. I don’t know how to move on from that.”
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