Man's family wants answers from police

Middletown, Conn. (WTNH) - In a tight-knit Middletown community where everybody knows their neighbor, a man is dead following a confrontation with police.

His family says the cops used excessive force and his neighbors say they don’t know how it possibly could have happened.

It started just before 8:00 Monday night on West Lake Drive in Middletown. Police say 35-year-old Efrain Carrion was irrational and despondent. He was in handcuffs when paramedics began their evaluation.
"EMS personnel began to evaluate the subject when the subject became extremely violent," explained Lt. J. Paul Vance, CT State Police.

Police described Carrion as a very large and powerful man. They tried to subdue him with a taser and a K-9.

"The individual was able to grab onto the K-9, choke the K-9 into unconsciousness and ran outside of his apartment," Vance said.

Even 24 hours after the incident neighbors see the tazer wire and medical waste that tell the story of what happened. Carrion was subdued by police and then collapsed.

Efrain's sister, Eunice Barrientos, witnessed the incident and disputes the officers' version of events. She says she called the police for help and they ended up killing her brother, a father, a husband and a victim of police brutality.

"He was handcuffed in the back, there was no way for him to touch a dog cause he was handcuffed to the back," she said. "He was handcuffed and they just tased him and tased him and let the dog chew him up, they kicked him down the stairs."

Police do admit to tasering him multiple times. He lost consciousness and paramedics performed CPR. He was later pronounced dead at Middlesex Hospital.

The medical examiner will be doing an autopsy to determine what caused Carrion's death.

State police are conducting an investigation into the incident.

Tuesday night, the family members are still waiting for the police report and wondering how this happened. Until they have some answers, they don't want to say much more to the media.

Five Middletown police officers were injured.