Monday 20 June 2022 10:19 PM The father of teen who died after falling from ride says death is being 'swept ... trends now

The father of a Missouri teenager who died after he fell 430 feet from an amusement park ride says park officials are 'sweeping his son's death under the rug' because he is black.

Yarnell Sampson said at a news conference on Monday that authorities at the ICON Park in Orlando, Florida have continued to let the Free Fall ride stand since his son, Tyre, fell from the ride in March after he slipped out of his seat and crashed into the ground.

An autopsy revealed last week that Tyre died from blunt force trauma after he smashed into the concrete below the ride. It also revealed that Tyre weighed 393 pounds, well above the ride manual's weight limit of 287 pounds.

He suffered numerous broken bones and internal injuries in the fall, which was ruled an accidental death, and Yarnell said that at his funeral his son's bloated face was unrecognizable.

An initial report by outside engineers hired by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services also found that sensors on the ride had been adjusted manually to double the size of the opening for restraints on two seats, resulting in Sampson not being properly secured. 

In the aftermath, Yarnell said on Monday, park officials vowed to put up a memorial for Tyre at the site - but when he returned to the park this weekend, he noticed the memorial that was there was taken down, and the park was hosting a festival at the site.

'They were supposed to erect a permanent memorial,' famed civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing Tyre's family, said at the news conference.

'There was no evidence that his son ever died here.' 

Meanwhile, the ride has remained closed since the incident as the investigation continues.

'I don't want to use the race thing,' Yarnell said at the news conference in front of the park on Monday. 'But I believe that because my son is a black young man, he is getting treated like this. I believe if it was a European child, it would have been different.'

Yarnell went on to describe his son as a top student, who played for the number one youth football team in the country, loved to do magic and was a talented rapper.

'Everything was lining up for him to be great,' he said. 'Plus he has talent. He could rap. He was a magician. He had a lot of other things besides football going for him, so why doesn't his life matter?'

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Tyre was visiting Orlando - the amusement park capital of the world - with his friend's family on March 24 when he died.

His friends have previously said the teen who was 6 foot five inches had been turned away from other rides for his 383 pound size

But when he approached the Free Fall ride, his family claims, he was not turned away - and instead amusement park operators manually changed the sensors on the ride to manually adjust the restraints on Tyre's seat.

As a result, they claim, he was not properly restrained, and could be seen in a video that circulated after his death apparently falling as magnets activated to slow the ride down on its descent.

'Tyre was too big to have been on that ride. There is no question about that,' famed civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing the family, told reporters on Monday.

But he added: 'These companies can't get away with this putting profit over safety.' 

Yarnell is now trying to get 25,000 signed petitions to get the ride taken down, he said at the news conference, claiming that if it

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