“Everywhere I travel in America, people tell me some story about how hard it is for a decent/educated/deserving European or Canadian to get into the US as an immigrant, yet here we are taking the mentally ill from Africa who will never benefit from a life in a first world country.” -ANN CORCORAN of Refugee Resettlement Watch

LOUISVILLE IS BECOMING A BIG TARGET FOR THE STATE DEPARTMENT PUSH FOR REFUGEES

Police in Louisville, Kentucky, are taking heat for the fatal shooting of a Sudanese refugee, who charged at an officer while swinging a metal flagpole just moments after he had assaulted a random woman on the street.

The man, identified as 35-year-old Deng Manyoun, was staggering as if intoxicated when he ignored an officer’s command to drop the seven-foot flagpole. Officer Nathan Blanford, a 10-year veteran of the Louisville police force, shot him dead.

It was later learned that the Sundanese man did not speak any English.

He lived in one of the poorest sections of the city, “where people are just trying to get by,” a local resident who lives in the community told WND.

It is not known exactly how Deng Manyoun entered the country, but he is believed to be a refugee from the Dinka tribe in south Sudan.

Manyoun entered the U.S. as a refugee from Sudan in 2001, according to an Associated Press report. He was originally resettled in Nashville, Tennessee, by Catholic Charities, a resettlement contractor that works for the government using federal grant money.

The U.S. State Department has imported thousands of refugees from war-torn Sudan since the 1990s.

Manyoun had an extensive rap sheet and history of mental illness. And police Monday released new information that he was, indeed, the perpetrator they were seeking Saturday when they responded to a call about an assault on a woman.

Police Chief Steve Conrad said the officer responded to a call about a woman who was assaulted in the 300 block of West Oak Street just after 2 p.m. Saturday.

A man, later identified as Manyoun, had grabbed a woman’s purse, threw her cell phone, and punched her in the face, police said.

The officer pulled up in his squad car to confront Manyoun as a suspect in the earlier beating of the woman. The two engaged verbally for a moment, and then Manyoun walked away, only to return moments later with the flagpole.

Blanford pulled out his gun as Manyoun charged him with a metal flagpole he grabbed from the facade of the Smoker’s Smoke Shop on Fourth Street. In the store’s video, Manyoun is seen swinging downward “in a sledge hammer type motion” with the pole, striking Blanton’s squad car as the officer moved to get out of the way, Conrad said at a press conference.

Blanford then fired his gun, hitting Manyoun twice.

Watch video of flagpole-wielding African immigrant shot by police officer in Louisville:

Manyoun did not know the woman he was allegedly beating on the street before police arrived Saturday, police said.

Lt. Kevin DeSpain, commander of the Louisville Police Department’s Professional Standards Unit, told WND that the first priority of his investigators is to seek out any other video that might be available from area businesses. He said one video has been located of the original assault on the woman.

DeSpain said the Sudanese immigrant had a lengthy criminal history and may have suffered from mental illness.

“Based on the number of CIT runs (by crisis intervention teams), it looks like there may have been a high probability of mental health issues,” he said.

DeSpain said the investigation has not yet determined how Manyoun entered the country and whether he was a legal or illegal immigrant. If he did enter the the refugee resettlement program, he would be considered a legal immigrant.

“We haven’t gotten to that yet, but it’s on our list,” DeSpain

Using the spelling Manyuon instead of Manyoun, a search of the man’s name brings up a mugshot for the June 2 arrest, along with others for resisting arrest, menacing, and indecent exposure, the Daily Beast reported.

Court records also show a man named Deng Wol Manyuon – also spelled Deng Manyoun in news articles – was charged with assaulting a federal courtroom security officer.

That arrest came in August 2013, when Manyoun was at a citizenship and immigration office inside a federal courthouse in Louisville, according to the Daily Beast. As an employee at a service window was assisting him, he reached under the protective glass and knocked over her computer monitor and other items, according to one deputy U.S. Marshals arrest affidavit.

Manyoun tried to throw a trash can at a court security officer and punched him in the face, the document states.

Court documents show Manyoun required an interpreter to speak Dinka, the language of a pastoral ethnic group in South Sudan, the Daily Beast reported. He later pleaded guilty in July 2014, after requesting a psychological examination.

All told, Manyoun had been arrested 16 times since 2008, often for drunken and disorderly conduct and showing a pattern of violent resistance toward police.

Read more: WND