The 75-year-old man hospitalized by Buffalo police and called an 'antifa provocateur' by Trump is actually a Catholic peace activist and volunteer, his friends say

• Martin Gugino, the 75-year-old man injured when he was shoved to the ground by Buffalo police, is a Catholic activist and volunteer, his friends say.
• They describe as "ridiculous" a baseless claim by President Donald Trump that he could have been "an ANTIFA provocateur" and part of an anti-police "set up."
• Friends told The Washington Post, BuzzFeed News, and The New York Times that Gugino has long protested and volunteered on issues like social justice, climate change, and police brutality.
• Gugino has been moved out of intensive care and is being moved to the hospital's rehabilitation floor, where he could be released in two weeks, his attorney said.

Friends describe the elderly man who was violently shoved and left bleeding by Buffalo police during anti-police-brutality protest as a Catholic peace activist who cared for his dying mom and helped the poor.

They also strongly rebuke a baseless theory aired by President Donald Trump that he is part of a conspiracy make police look bad.

A graphic video shows Martin Gugino, who is aged 75, walk up to officers in in Buffalo, New York. They then violently shove him to the ground.

He is shown lying on the ground, bleeding from his ear, as officers then walk past him.

The footage, which has been widely shared, has turned into another flash point in the tensions over police violence and power after the killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis.

You can watch the video here. It is a graphic depiction of violence:

President Donald Trump on Tuesday tweeted a conspiracy theory that Gugino is part of antifa — a decades-old, leaderless group whose name stands for "anti-fascist". Trump has accused the group of being behind the protests, though there is also little evidence for this.

Trump's tweet said that Gugino "could be an ANTIFA provocateur" and that he had appeared to try and interfere with police scanning equipment. The president added: "Could be a set up?"

But Gugino's friends describe him as a devout Catholic who was passionate about social justice, human rights, and addressing inequality. They said he has been protesting for decades on issues including climate change, police brutality, and nuclear weapons.

One friend, Keith Giles, told BuzzFeed News that Trump's post was "just ridiculous."

"We know the president will never back down and will never apologize for this," Giles, the program director for Peace Catalyst International, a Jesuit group in Texas, said.

Giles told CNN that he was "horrified" by Trump's tweet.

Kathy Kelly, 67, who has known Gugino since meeting at while fasting at a 2010 rally to close the Guantánamo Bay detention facility, described him to BuzzFeed News as "someone who listened very patiently and always had a benevolent attitude towards people."

She said she was not surprised to see him walk toward "a group of armed people" in the video.

"It didn't surprise me anymore than Gandhi walking towards armed British soldiers," she said. "It was something he would do, believing that he was approaching another human being."

She also laughed as she dismissed the idea that Gugino could be a part of antifa.

And she also dismissed the idea that he could have staged a fall.

"Would he stage something in a crafty way to accomplish a photo op? I greatly doubt that,"she said.

"That blood...forming a pool on the pavement represented a great deal of wisdom accrued by one individual who earnestly studied ways to create a better world."

Mark Colville, who has known Gugino for years and who runs a Catholic center that offers meals and prayer in New Haven, Connecticut, told The Washington Post: "Martin has a passion for social justice."

"When he sees wrong he wants to be involved in making it right."

He said that Gugino, a retired computer scientist, made multiple six-and-a-half hour trips from near Buffalo to New Haven to help prepare and serve the center's meals.

Colville told the Post that Gugino was a private person who lived alone and did not want attention for what he did.

Gugino cared for his mother until her death, and his sister also recently died, the Post reported.

Colville took Gugino's place at the protest, on the same street where he was shoved, after he was denied entry to visit him in the hospital.

Gugino also worked with Witness Against Torture, a group that protests how detainees in Guantanamo Bay are treated, the Post reported, as well as active in the affordable housing movement.

Other friends told both BuzzFeed News and the Post that they know Gugino to be passionate and peaceful.

J±udy Metzger, 85, who lives near Gugino in Amherst, a Buffalo suburb, told The New York Times: "Martin is a very gentle, a very pleasant person."

Gugino has also long been active with the Black Lives Matter movement.

He protested after the death of Tamir Rice, a Black 12-year-old that was shot dead by a police officer in 2014.

The Post reported that he travelled to Cleveland, Ohio, where he met Rice's parents, and he joined protesters in front of Justice Department who called for the officer who shot Rice to face murder charges.

Gugino was put in intensive care

And Kelly Zarcone, Gugino's attorney, said told Buzzfeed News he had been moved from intensive care to his own room, while remaining in serious condition.

Zarcone told CNN that he is being moved to the hospital's rehabilitation floor, that his condition is improving, and and that "we hope he will be released within the next 2 weeks."

Zarcone called Trump's suggestions "absolutely ridiculous."

She said that Gugino "totally denies" that he is part of antifa and said that law enforcement has not suggested anything else.

"We are at a loss to understand why the President of the United States would make such dark, dangerous, and untrue accusations against him," Zarcone said.

"All these things that people are making up are not helpful."

She said he was "just trying to recover and he's even too tired to form words most of the time."

Two officers were suspended with pay over the incident.

Fifty-seven Buffalo police officers then resigned en masse on Friday in protest at the suspension.