Fort Worth Police Chief Joel Fitzgerald is being criticized for not denouncing the actions by a Fort Worth (TX) Officer as racist until an investigation is completed.
“There’s a difference between rude and racism,” the chief said last week.
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The officer arrested Jacqueline Craig and her daughters during a confrontation last Wednesday. She called police to report that a neighbor had choked her 7-year-old son.
WFAA reports that activists and the family are demanding that the officer be fired immediately and charged with a crime before the end of the year. They also want the neighbor to be charged with choking the boy and they want the criminal charges dropped against Craig and her daughters.
Reverend Michael Bell of Greater St. Stephen First Church said that “Our community is being denied that the type of justice that those on the other side of town receive as a matter of routine.”
Activists are calling the way the officer handled the incident an example of “white privilege.”
The 29-minute cell phone video begins before the officer arrives on scene. Craig’s 19-year-old daughter Brea Hymond is on Facebook Live.
The neighbor is painting the fence as Craig and her family members surround and taunt him with profanity-laden language and make racial comments toward him. He ignores them.
Police also say that the neighbor was the first to call the police.
At one point, Craig is seen on the phone talking to 911, telling an operator that the neighbor choked her son.
Several minutes later, the officer walks up and briefly talks to the neighbor.
Craig explains to the officer that her daughter told her that the neighbor had choked her son. She says she asked the neighbor why he put his hands on her son. She says he told her that he choked her son after he refused to pick up the paper.
“My son is seven years old. He don’t have the right to grab him, choke him behind no paper that he threw,” she tells the officer.
The officer, wearing sunglasses, has his hands on his gun belt, as he says, “Why don’t you teach your son not to litter?”
Things quickly escalate.
You can watch the full video below.
