Courtesy Dan Carmody
Stills from witness phone video of arrest aftermath.
Jerome Richardson and his allies say the cops provoked an argument with him, falsely arrested him, and used excessive force. The cops say their officers used restraint as Richardson taunted them and prevented them from handling three separate, simultaneous tense public-safety matters.
You can watch the video and decide for yourself.
The accusations stem from an incident that occurred Tuesday around 5:15 p.m. at the bus stop at Church and Chapel streets.
The cops arrested Richardson, who’s 25, on charges of breach of peace and interference. They said that he got in their way as they tried to make unrelated arrests. They brought him to the police station. Witnesses and other social-justice activists who happened to be present followed in protest of what they called police misconduct. The police later released Richardson on a promise to appear in court.
Now top cops are sifting through the different versions of what happened, and through multiple police body-camera videos. One of the witnesses, activist Kerry Ellington, submitted a written statement to the internal affairs division Wednesday afternoon with her version.
In response to a request form the Independent, the police expedited release of body camera footage of the arrest. Another activist present, Dan Carmody, provided cellphone video footage of the immediate aftermath.
The case, including other situations the police were handling at the time of Richardson’s arrest, brings to the fore three separate current trends in public discussion about policing:
• The prevalence of police and citizen video in assessing police actions.
• The training of police to deescalate, rather than escalate, situations with citizens with whom they come into conflict.
• The debate over how police should deal with public disorder on the Green, where homeless people as well as substance abusers who come to town for methadone treatment often congregate. The police face both pressure from the public to restore order and criticism from activists about respecting people’s rights.
Assistant Police Chief Otoniel Reyes, who oversees patrol, said Wednesday that it will take a while to get the full story. Much more video footage remains to be examined, to show the incident from multiple angles as well as the 20 minutes of lead-up involving heated discussions between Richardson and the police. An internal review will also include interviews with officers on the scene.
“We haven’t made any verdict yet. We’re looking at it,” Reyes said. “Preliminarily it doesn’t appear like the officers broke any rules. This was clearly someone who was baiting the officers.” The review will look in part at “if this incident could have been handled differently.”
Jerome Richardson said the police could have done one big thing differently: Leave him alone. He said he suffered a bloody lip and facial swelling as a result of the takedown.
“I understand cops have their job to do. It felt like it was unlawful,” Richardson told the Independent. “I’m only about 135 pounds soaking wet. For them to have two officers take me down, it was painful.”
Crunch Time
NHPD
Stills from body cam video of arrest.
Police had their hands full at the time of Tuesday’s incident. Officers were responding to three separate incidents near the bus stops on the Green directly across form 900 Chapel St.: A woman had passed out from an apparent overdose; officers were working to get her medical help. They came across a person wanted on a warrant. And a man was drinking alcohol from an open container.
Jerome Richardson was hanging out in the area. So were people he knows from a local police-monitoring activist group, who were handing out flyers for a film series.
Richardson,who is 25 and currently unemployed, said he “witnessed an officer antoagonizing a civilian.” He said the police were arresting her without “reading her her rights.”
As a Wilbur Cross student, Richardson had participated in a group called Youth Rights Media, which researched and documented allegations of police misconduct. He began speaking up about the police in this case.
“I was under the impression that if somebody was going to be arrested,” Richardson recalled telling one of the officers. “I didn’t want to cause a scene and look like I was interfering with the officers. I began to ask the officers the questions: Can you arrest a person without reading their rights? After they began to tell me I was wrong that you don’t have to read somebody their rights to be arrested, they appeared to be antagonizing another person.”
(According to Assistant Chief Racheal Cain, officers do not by law have to read arrestees their rights to remain silent at the time of their arrest — unless they’re being interrogated about matters about which they can claim a constitutional right to avoid self-incrimination. Those Miranda rights are usually read at the police station when officers or detectives question arrestees.)
Activist Ellington happened to come upon the scene at that point on her way home from work. She used to work with Richardson at Youth Rights Media. They shook hands, hugged. “The police are harassing people,” Richardson told her.
They also ran into Dan Carmody, one of the activists handing out flyers. He had been helping a man on a bench set up a bluetooth speaker when the man “took a swig from a plastic bag” and was then confronted by officers, Carmody later told the Independent. He said the officers reported the man had an open warrant, and began to arrest him.
Carmody joined the conversation with Ellington and Richardson and complained about police misconduct.
They stood a few feet away from the officers dealing with the other arrests and intoxication problems. Richardson’s back was to the officers. But they could hear his remarks.
The next moments are visible in an officer body camera video police released Wednesday afternoon to the Independent. (It appears at the top of this story.)
“What rights are you speaking of?” Officer John Brangi asked Richardson.
“I’m not even talking to you,” Richardson said.
“I’ll talk to whoever I want,” responded Brangi. (Brangi is a member of the cadet class of 2015, at whose graduation Mayor Toni Harp warned new officers to be prepared for “closer scrutiny” from the public in the new era of citizen video and calls for police accountability.)
“And I’m going to talk to whoever I want to,” Richardson stated as he turned to face the officer.
Officer Michael Hinton (another member of the Class of 2015) stepped forwarded. He ordered Richardson to “give us some room to work.”
“Why?” Richardson asked. “Our conversaton was right here.”
At that point Hinton reached his hand to Richardson.
“Yo,” Richardson told the officer. “Don’t touch me.”
Police said Hinton was acting to guide Richardson away from a scene so officers could do their work. Richardson, Ellington and Carmody said Hinton “shoved” Richardson.
In either case, multiple officers were soon wrestling Richardson to the ground.
“Stop resisting,” one officer commanded as the cops were handcuffing Richardson.
“I’m not resisting,” he responded.
“Give me your arm.”
“You got it. You got it. You got it. You got it. You got it. I’m not moving.”
Richardson and Carmody pulled out their phones to video-record the incident. They were too late the capture the arrest, but they caught the aftermath.
An officer ordered Ellington and others to step back, while stating that they were free to video-record.
“Don’t touch me sir,” Ellington said.
The above video shows what Carmody captured with his phone.
Ellington and Carmody, and a number of the other leafletters and their allies, proceeded to 1 Union Ave., asked for information on Richardson, and waited a few hours until his release. They vowed to press the accusations of misconduct.
Click here to read the statement that Ellington submitted the following day to the police.
Early Video Tests
Courtesy Dan Carmody
Richardson outside 1 Union Ave. after his release. Below: Close-up of his lip.
Courtesy Dan Carmody
Both sides — police officials and the activists — argued that events not shown on the video released so far or seen from different body-camera angles would bolster their cases: That Richardson had been taunting the police and getting in the way (according to cops); or that he had been minding his own business when the police created and then escalated a confrontation.
Under Freedom of Information law, the police did not have to release any body camera footage as soon as Wednesday, less than 24 hours after the event. Assistant Chief Cain said the department is committed to offering video as promptly as possible to address concerns raised by the public.
Releasing more footage will take longer because staff has to screen it carefully to see if any parts need to be redacted under law. And like other departments that have also recently outfitted officers with body cameras, the police are facing multiple requests that can back up. The Board of Alders last week removed a position from the new city budget that would have helped the police handle these video-release requests by adding another staff person.
Police departments are still getting used to the process of handling body camera video and responding to public requests for release. Results from early tests have been mixed. Yale University’s police department — in this instance —sought to find reasons to delay release as long as possible, or even not to release video at all, in the very kinds of case that the new cameras were supposed to help address. (Yale has a history of skirting Freedom of Information law with its police department, which has state-granted powers to detain, arrest and shoot people.) New Haven’s department, in early tests like Tuesday’s incident on the Green and this one last December, has found ways, even with stretched resources, to respond promptly.
I don't respect the police either.
I don't want their help in an emergency.
Did you see how the initial subject just wanted to "gtf away" from the rowdy kid? He laughed... you know why? It wasn't the kid who was the threat. It was the cops who at any minute could have started shooting.
Police should tested for steroids every six months
And be disarmed. The level of disrespect shown to these police officers is warranted.
God bless the freedom fighters who have the courage to treat police like that.