Let's help, Arawn, a street medic injured by APD

Hello, I am Sean Philips, an Austin resident and a vehement supporter of Black Lives Matters and the peaceful protestors that fight for their cause. I am here today to ask for the community to come together and help a friend of mine, who suffered a bad injury to his hand and wrist, as well as one to his leg, all due to the unethical, irrational and indiscriminate use of "less-lethal" rounds by the Austin Police Department. 

While serving as a volunteer street medic with the non-partisan group Street Medics Austin, my good friend, Arawn, took fire from one  of the so-called bean bag ammunition to his  arm. It is worth mentioning that these "bean bags" are really a small bag  filled with #9 lead shot that is fired from a 12 gauge shotgun. 

Here is a portion of  The Washington Post article about that weekend and the atrocities committed by APD that involves Arawn's experience on that horrific day:

>>AUSTIN — Steve Arawn remembers the moment he no longer recognized Austin, the city he has called home for more than a decade.

The 43-year-old volunteer medic was on a grassy embankment rushing to the aid of an injured protester in downtown Austin. Perched atop an elevated highway to his left, police officers were unleashing a volley of bean bag rounds into the crowd of demonstrators surrounding him.

“The level of brutality was shocking,” an astonished Arawn said a day later, his wrist bandaged and his leg marked by a dark red and purple bruise. “I just couldn’t believe something like this was happening in Austin.”<<

A little about Arawn. He has lived in Austin over a decade, which by ATX standards pretty much makes him a native! He is happily married, with two sons, as well as a bonus son and a bonus daughter. Proving that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, his oldest boy happily volunteered along side him as a medic during the protest!

He, like most of the Austin Street Medics is involved in the local burn scene (small regional burning man events) where he volunteers a lot of his free time serving as a ranger making sure everyone is safe. In his daily life, he works as a gig worker, like so many Austinites. As I am sure you can guess, not only does that mean he is amongst the 27.5 million uninsured Americans, it also means he has no source of income  while he is unable to work due to these injuries.

For the sake of full disclosure as far as why I am setting the goal at 2k,  Arawn averages $150 a day and works five days a week. He has already missed one week, and will be missing at least one more. As of yesterday (Friday, June 5th) we was finally seen by a doctor. Before that, he was only able to be seen by a nurse practitioner due to his lack of insurance. The doctor that saw him prescribed a nerve relaxer that takes about 7-10 days to start working, during that period he will also need to be taking Vicodin to help mask the pain. As a delivery driver, he is unable to work while on pain meds, for obvious reasons, so I want to make sure that missed work doesn't add another stress to a man who has already suffered enough.

The next step will be having an MRI done and once they have those images they will know more about the proper path moving forward. The absolute best case scenario, is that it will heal itself in the next 30 days. The next best case would be him only needing a steroid injection and beyond that it is unknown. If it requires surgery that will be a HUGE expense as well as more missed work 
 
We are looking to raise 2k to cover his missed work and to help with some of the medical expenses he has incurred so far. If the progonosis following the MRI is bad, I will raise the goal to compensate for that. When I mentioned this to Arawn, he insisted that any money raised over the goal, if not needed to cover unforseen expenses, be donated to Black Lives Matter's local Austin branch, because that is just the type of man he is. 

I know there are a lot of pages just like this one for the countless others who suffered at the hands of trigger happy, under trained police officers during the protest in Austin and all over the country. That being said, I ask that you consider donating to help support Arawn with the same selflessness and generosity he showed while putting himself in the line of fire to take care of the peaceful protestors who suffered injuries during the protest.

We are a community of many, and if a small fraction of us chip in just the cost of a cup of coffee (and I am talking 7-11 coffee not some overpriced bougie frapa-whatever) we will quickly exceed our goal, and in doing so take care of a man who was only trying to take care of the community and, hopefully,  raise some money for BLM Austin as well!

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and keep on keeping on!

-Sean (Guru)