AMHERST — A video showing an Amherst police officer telling several detained teenagers that they have no rights, recorded earlier this month, is prompting members of a former municipal panel that recommended public safety alternatives to demand town officials speed up efforts to confront racism and promote restorative justice.
Residents who served on the Community Safety Working Group, which pushed for the creation of the Community Response for Equity, Safety and Service (CRESS) department and a Youth Empowerment Center, issued a statement suggesting that the 54 seconds of footage, taped late on the evening of July 4 or early on the morning of July 5, indicates that racial bias continues in Amherst, and accountability is being ignored.
“The research and community voices we spent over a year collecting and sharing with the Town Council and Town Manager are still being silenced,” reads a portion of the communication sent to the Gazette by member Pat Ononibaku on Wednesday.
“Apartment complexes in Amherst are still being oversurveilled by the Amherst Police Department, youth who have no spaces such as a Youth Empowerment Center are being criminalized, youth and community members are being traumatized and mistreated, while an abuse of power and fear of retaliation continues.”
Brianna Owen and At-Large Councilor Ellisha Walker, who co-chaired the working group, and Tashina Bowman, Darius Cage, Debora Ferreira and Russ Vernon-Jones all signed onto the statement.
“The delay in such recommendations are telling as incidents continue to unfold, and while we wait, community members suffer,” reads the statement. “No action is action.”
Town Manager Paul Bockelman sent a statement by email Thursday about the town’s work on these matters, including the creation of CRESS, whose responders are in the midst of an eight-week training regimen following their swearing-in on July 5, and the fully staffed Department of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, which will have as one of its first tasks creating a Police Resident Oversight Board.
“The town of Amherst is clear in its commitment to eradicate the effects of systemically racist practices in town government,” Bockelman wrote. “The town believes in fostering and maintaining a safe and welcoming community, which is based on mutual respect for our residents, students, employees, businesses and guests. We stand and work for these values because it fosters a safer, more welcoming environment and better quality of life for all members of the Amherst community.”
Initially posted to YouTube youtube.com/watch?v=ZeOBWfVwZ0g and social media by resident Vira Douangmany Cage, the footage shows officers speaking with youths whom the Community Safety Working Group members say are mostly from the Black, Indigenous and people of color (BIPOC) communities.
“Waiting for any Amherst town official to address this incident. Silence speaks volumes,” Doungmany Cage wrote on Facebook. She said she wouldn’t divulge how she obtained the video.
According to the police dispatch log, the response was made to a lower Main Street apartment complex for a complaint about loud voices, on July 5 at 12:32 a.m. There, officers found a vehicle broken down due to a flat tire and a number of teens waiting for a tow truck. Parents and guardians were contacted because the youths were unable to drive home, and the scene was cleared at 1:26 a.m.
The footage shows officers telling the teens they have no rights due to their ages, the time of day and the response to a noise complaint. Officers tried to identify each person, through driver’s licenses or school IDs, and appeared to not allow anyone to depart immediately.
“Dude, I don’t need to hear that you have your rights, because right now, as a juvenile, you don’t have rights at this point,” one officer can be heard saying. The officer continues, “you’ve lost it, all right, you’ve lost it, you’re not an adult.”
A teen can be heard saying, “I’m waiting for AAA to come and help me with my flat tire.”
The other officer elaborated about the situation. “You don’t get to make a call right now because we’ve said so. You’re detained, because you can’t be out right now.” “In Amherst there are bylaws for noise, OK?”
The teen asks about the idea of not having any rights, to which the second officer responds, “poor phrasing.”
Bockelman said police leadership, CRESS and DEI staff are all reviewing the video.
Efforts to reach Amherst police leadership were unsuccessful.
“We are proud of the tangible steps the town has taken so far to ensure all members of our community feel safe,” Bockelman said. “We know there is much, much more work to do throughout the town and its departments. In our review of this situation, we are ready and committed to learn any lessons that will help us to better meet our goals going forward.”
The statement from the former Community Safety Working Group members also asks that noise complaints fall under the community responders program:
“We are also urging town leaders to allow CRESS to take on noise complaint calls so incidents such as this do not turn into detainment of youth, abuse of power, and a lack of individual and parental rights for BIPOC community members.”
