Friday, August 10, 2007

Policeman Pepper Sprays, Arrests Black Teenage Wendy's Waitress for Refusing to Give Extra Change

This video is infuriating. Here's a transcript I've made of the voice-over of the above video, in which a white police officer insists (incorrectly) that he has been short-changed at Wendy's, and then he maces and arrests a 17-year old Black waitress, even after the restaurant manager has proved to the police officer that he has received correct change:
Dayton, Ohio. Seventeen year-old Brandy Martin’s working the drive through. Working for minimum wage is bad enough, but it’s about to get a whole lot worse.

She takes an order for three dollars and sixty-four cents. It’s for a cop, Michael McDonald. He pays her and she gives him his change. Seems routine, right? Wrooong!

After McDonald pulls out, he thinks she short-changed him. He’s sure he gave her a twenty, but he only got change for a ten.

Brandy’s manager checks the cash register while the cop waits. The manager tells the cop, “Randy don’t got no twenties.” ( . . .) But, the cop’s still thinking she’s holding out on him.

Ut oh! Five-O in the house! And he wants his two-all! [Is this really funny to be joking about it?]

The cop pepper sprays her full in the face. Listen close! You can hear Brandy wheezing and trying to breathe. They can’t take her to the police station, ‘cause now she has to go to the hospital.

Let’s go back before all hell breaks loose. The cop pays Brandy. Freeze and zoom in! This spot’s for ones. This one’s for fives, this one’s for tens, and THIS one’s for twenties. It looks to us like Brandy puts the change in the ten-dollar slot. The manager checks the drawer. He don’t see no twenties neither. The tape don’t lie! Brandy is right and the cop is wrong.

Brandy files a case against the police department. The officer is cleared of all wrong-doing, but Brandy gets sixty-thousand bucks! It’s another special day in Dayton, Ohio.
I Googled this case and determined that the police officer in question was later fired from the force, because the video proved that his behavior was outrageous and intolerable:
DAYTON, Ohio -- The police chief on Friday fired a patrolman who arrested a fast-food restaurant worker, then doused her with pepper spray in a dispute over payment for his food.

Police Chief Ronald Lowe said Officer Michael McDonald's conduct violated the community's trust. Inquirer.Com
The EnMasse blog says:
While this particular incident occurred 9 years ago, IMO it's a good illustration of why so many [people of color] (and poor whites as well) distrust police. What makes this tape so different from many of the other tapes showing even worse brutality (too many to list) is that in this one, we know for sure the girl is completely innocent (mouthing off is not a crime) while the cop was clearly in the wrong. In most of the other tapes, we only see the brutality, not whether the suspect in question actually committed what he/she was accused of. EnMasse blog
Would the police officer have been fired and would Brandy have received any compensation in the absence of the videotape, and perhaps the testimony of her white co-workers? I doubt it!

And so begin the efforts of this Police Brutality Blog, to post reports and documentation of police brutality from the United States and other countries, to build a resistance movement so that Blacks and other human beings can work and live without living in fear of police brutality.

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

The cop was later rehired. So much for justice.

Link

Anonymous said...

the person who wrote this blog is obviously racist towards whites.

Yeah this is police brutality, but this blog writer is throwing in the race card, and must be black himself.



It seems like the blog writer needs to meet a friend of mine, called a noose.

Anonymous said...

This girl was a stupid idiot who acted like a jerk and got what she deserved. You don't stand up and get "in your face" with a cop. All she had to do was explain (politely) "Sir, we have no twenties in the drawer--my manager looked, and I'm sure you are mistaken". She demonstrated that she has no respect for authority, and from her comment about her brother being in prison, it sounds like it runs in the family.

If I had been her manager, I would have dismissed her immediate, on the spot, for being such a loud-mouthed, vulgar, belligerant nincompoop. She obviously didn't have sense enough to realize that she was making a complete fool of herself.

I don't blame the cop one bit. The way she was acting gave him no reason to believe her.

Anonymous said...

No. The cop needed to complain to the manager and had no right to interrupt her work in the store, I don't know what could have possibly make him think he had the kind of authority to do that. What's even worse is that he could have spent the time he used to badger this girl over his stupid mistake to serve our community for real.

And to the people who think its unreasonable to bring the race card into this whole thing I think your completely wrong. The cop sent this girl to the hospital basically over TEN DOLLARS. This is obviously unreasonable and if you can make sense out of it without assuming he had personal prejudices against blacks then wow please share with me.

Anonymous said...

This is a racist post. Cops treat ALL of us like crap, not just blacks and poor whites. They're on a power trip. They've treated many whites that I know really poorly. Thank god for video. It's at least a witness.

Francis Holland said...

Anonymous, there is a difference between a post that discusses skin color and a "racist post". Justice Department statistics show that Blacks and Latinos are three times as likely to report abuse and car searches during traffic stops than are whites. These statistics don't lie and reporting them is not "racist".

The Daily Warren said...

I hope you people aren't STILL this stupid.
It's a cop.
He said "go". You go. We call this c-i-v-i-l-i-z-a-t-i-o-n.
I would've liked to see that cop's face when he viewed the tape and heard the manager.
But I never will.
Justice was NOT done, because justice belongs to civilized peoples.
But you can feel justice, sometimes. Like right after the officer pepper sprays her and she very coherently asks, "Where are you taking me?" Suddenly she can speak English and cooperate.
"Naked force has resolved more conflicts than any other means in history." - Mr. Ratcek, Starship Troopers (played by Michael Ironsides, who RULES!!!)

Anonymous said...

That's not called "civilization" you idiot, that's called "domination."

We had a whole revolution against a government that imposed its will against the people without lawful cause. We kicked the redcoats asses back to England and now you guys are cheering for them because they changed their shirts to blue.

Adherence to the police no matter what, no matter if you're innocent and they're corrupt? I'm sorry, I don't speak German. Idiot.

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Unknown said...

When police like this animal in the video gets shot, they would deserve it. That dumb racist was told by the manager that he wasn't short changed, yet come up in the store asking for money. He is totally wrong in alll points of view, complete idiot!!! no wonder people shoot them for no reason sometimes....

Marauder65 said...

You're a complete idiot who couldn't manage a fly! He had no damn business coming behind the counter of that restaurant, and treating her like that.

cathy658 said...

Troy you have to be the biggest ass on the planet. She told him, her manager told him. This cop was a jerk and needed to be brought up on assault charges. I have the right to mouth off to whoever I damn well please. Find yourself a hole and fall in please.

Unknown said...

So sad that so many racist are blatantly racist!!

Unknown said...

Alot of white people seem to be secretly racist, oh well

Unknown said...

This cop is definitely a product of Inbreeding

Unknown said...

This is both the brutality of a "cop" who was later reinstated to the police academy. It was definitely racially motivated. The girl was acting very badly, angry of being accused and she said of cops putting her brother in prison. But, over $10? He cannot be trusted to be a Badged, armed cop with such hatred for people. He accused and the punished her: imagine his violence if there were no witnesses?

Our tax dollars wasted. Our trust betrayed.

Unknown said...

Anonymous, you are the racist "It seems like the blog writer needs to meet a friend of mine, called a noose."
Hiding under your white sheet and taking shots at people who want to bring injustice to light? If Michael McDonald were a civilian who went inside a Wendy's, back behind the counter to the cash register and insisted on getting his money after a manager told him there weren't any 20 dollar bills in the drawer, HE would have been the one getting arrested.