PITTSBURGH — Pittsburgh Public Safety is reviewing an officer’s use of force after a Downtown arrest Monday that left a 31-year-old man hospitalized, according to his family.
The incident happened near Fifth Avenue and Wood Street, a busy Downtown intersection outside PNC Bank and near a police substation just after 5:30 p.m.
Camri Cosby said her brother, Roy Cosby, is now out of the hospital and recovering.
She said he suffered broken ribs, a broken eye socket and bleeding in his brain.
“My brother did not have to be treated like that over a bus,” she said.
Camri Cosby said her brother became upset after a bus he had been waiting for passed his stop.
She said he ran to the next stop and got on the bus there.
“He was just a little upset that he had to do all that running, so it wasn’t really no conflict with the bus driver and him, but the bus driver did tell him to get off the bus,” she said. “He was like ‘well since I just ran all the way down here, I just want to go home, I don’t want to get off the bus’, and he said ‘well if you don’t get off the bus, then that’s when we’re going to have to call the police.”
Public Safety officials said two Pittsburgh police officers, working an off-duty assignment at PNC Bank, responded to help Port Authority police with a man reportedly causing a disturbance on a bus.
Officials said officers removed Cosby from the bus.
They allege he cursed loudly and refused to leave the area.
Authorities said the officers then took Cosby into custody and used force during the arrest.
Ella Plummer witnessed the incident and began recording shortly after, she said, an officer made physical contact with Cosby.
“The one cop started punching him in the face,” Plummer said. “His whole eye was black, it was swollen, there was blood dripping down his face.”
Plummer said she believes the force used was unnecessary.
“That was way too much, and he wasn’t even resisting,” she said. “There was no need to punch him in the face. There was no need to even put him on the ground.”
Cosby’s family is now demanding accountability and consequences for the officer’s use of force.
“You beat him to the point where you had to take him to the hospital,” Camri Cosby said. “Punishment is well needed here because this is very much unbelievable.”
Officers released Cosby shortly after the arrest and took him to a hospital, according to Public Safety.
The Citizens Police Review Board said it is “very concerned” about the use of force and has opened an inquiry.
Channel 11 understands the two officers involved were not on leave as of Tuesday night.
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