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Every so often I think about posting something on Facebook, or Twitter. Sometimes I go so far as drafting it. I almost always change my mind and abandon it before posting. The drafts sit around in my notes app and gather dust, forgotten.
Let me tell you a story, one that I couldn't forget.
Around 10:30ish PM on Friday March 13th, I was walking along Boylston Street to Copley Station after my closing shift. There was a woman, probably intoxicated, wandering around talking and laughing loudly to herself on the sidewalk. Something about having found her phone after she thought she lost it? I shrugged and kept walking, because she was obviously harmless.
I had crossed the street at the intersection and almost gotten to the station when I noticed her shouting again, "Get off me." She was by the fancy glass-fronted Bank of America/Tuberculosis-12/AT&T stores, and there were several cops around her, grabbing her and patting her down. They forced her to the ground and six (6) big dudes bodily pinned her. She wasn't even really struggling, just yelling about it.
As I watched, more police vehicles with sirens and flashing lights kept pulling up. I counted nine (9) in total, each with at least two cops inside, all of which ran over and...stood around. Talking or something. While this poor woman was sat on by six people, then dragged up to her feet and restrained. I could barely see her through all the cops milling around her.
I am not exaggerating these numbers. The BPD sent almost two dozen officers, in enough vehicles to block off half the lanes of a major street, to tackle and hold down one (1) single unarmed drunk and/or mentally ill woman.
(You may have guessed it by now, knowing Boston and American policing in general, but she was Black.)
I think about her sometimes, about how confusing and horrible that experience must have been. I think about the police, wondering what the hell they thought they were doing. There's no way they could honestly have thought that situation needed so many officers, for one person who couldn't even fight back. Most of them ran over and then just casually stood around in a crowd, not even looking at her.
I wish I'd had a camera on me at the time. Not that it would have done her any good, but. Maybe having a video of it would have given me the confidence to go ahead and post that draft, instead of sitting on the memories for five and a half months.
Let me tell you a story, one that I couldn't forget.
Around 10:30ish PM on Friday March 13th, I was walking along Boylston Street to Copley Station after my closing shift. There was a woman, probably intoxicated, wandering around talking and laughing loudly to herself on the sidewalk. Something about having found her phone after she thought she lost it? I shrugged and kept walking, because she was obviously harmless.
I had crossed the street at the intersection and almost gotten to the station when I noticed her shouting again, "Get off me." She was by the fancy glass-fronted Bank of America/Tuberculosis-12/AT&T stores, and there were several cops around her, grabbing her and patting her down. They forced her to the ground and six (6) big dudes bodily pinned her. She wasn't even really struggling, just yelling about it.
As I watched, more police vehicles with sirens and flashing lights kept pulling up. I counted nine (9) in total, each with at least two cops inside, all of which ran over and...stood around. Talking or something. While this poor woman was sat on by six people, then dragged up to her feet and restrained. I could barely see her through all the cops milling around her.
I am not exaggerating these numbers. The BPD sent almost two dozen officers, in enough vehicles to block off half the lanes of a major street, to tackle and hold down one (1) single unarmed drunk and/or mentally ill woman.
(You may have guessed it by now, knowing Boston and American policing in general, but she was Black.)
I think about her sometimes, about how confusing and horrible that experience must have been. I think about the police, wondering what the hell they thought they were doing. There's no way they could honestly have thought that situation needed so many officers, for one person who couldn't even fight back. Most of them ran over and then just casually stood around in a crowd, not even looking at her.
I wish I'd had a camera on me at the time. Not that it would have done her any good, but. Maybe having a video of it would have given me the confidence to go ahead and post that draft, instead of sitting on the memories for five and a half months.
