What did I do to get frog marched by the cops?

 About ten years ago in Las Vegas, Nevada I called on the police for help. Minutes prior to my call, some money had been stolen from me. 

It took a long time for me to convince the dispatcher to send the police. It was her apparent opinion that I lost the money and that I was making up a story to cover my tracks. I became very aggressive with her, although I was not profane or insulting

It also took a long time for the police to arrive. Long enough that I waited outside as instructed until I got cold and then went to my room to get a warmer jacket. When I returned the police were waiting for me. I started to tell the officers what had happened. They almost immediately threw me in an arm lock and frog marched me to their cruiser. I was searched (although they missed my cell phone in the breast pocket of my jacket) and put in the back of the car. I instantly became very, very calm and cooperative. I knew, in an instant, that this interaction with the LVPD was not going to go my way. 

All I now wanted was for the evening to end with me not in police cells.

After my complaint was investigated, I was returned to my hotel and released. The entire interaction was about an hour.

I remain affected by this event. I know that I presented absolutely no threat to the police officers, although, I am sure that they will tell you that they perceived a threat. It appears that my aggressive interaction with the police dispatcher (after she had accused me of being a liar) had predisposed the officers to manhandle me without taking time to hear anything that I had to say. Their mind was made up before they arrived on scene. And, it seems clear to me that LVPD is on the side of the City – the casinos and bars. They are more interested in protecting the reputation of the town than they are in a couple of thousand dollars lost by a Canadian tourist.

With recent events, I have come to consider another aspect of this night. Although I was angry, I was not scared. Although the police handing of the event was atrocious, I did not fear the two police officers who handled me. I considered the possibility that I might be detained overnight but I was never concerned that something really awful would be done to me – that I would be driven out of town and dropped off or that I would be given a beating. These dark thoughts never even occurred to me.

If the same events had played out but instead of being a white, middle-class Canadian I was black, I suspect that I would have feared those two police officers. Context matters. Despite their foibles and imperfections, I trust police. Over the course of my life, my interactions with police have been positive. Police have been a force for good. I may offer criticism but, on a grand scale, I trust police. Even at my darkest moment with the cops, ten years ago in Las Vegas, I still trusted that they were not going to hurt me.

Black America, though, does not trust police. This should not surprise anyone. There are too many recent examples of police mistreating African Americans – black men in particular. More importantly, there are decades of examples of police behavior that is reprehensible. Can your mind’s eye see the iconic photo of a young black man being set upon by a police dog from Birmingham, Alabama April 7, 1963? Google image results for “Black man attacked by police dog” if you can’t remember the photo.

Protests in the aftermath of the Michael Brown and Eric Garner grand jury decisions not to indict the police officers in question are only partly about the specifics of each case. They are largely about the endemic feeling among black America that the police are not on their side. This endemic feeling is what needs to change and police need to be leaders. Police need to be exemplary. They need to earn the trust they feel they deserve because they have been undermining this trust for a long, long time.

And, Canada? My impression is that the gulf between police and some racial minorities is not as great as the U.S. but there is still a lot of trust to be earned, particularly between police and First Nations.

I cannot know how a black American man would have felt in my place in Las Vegas ten years ago. But, I am certain that he would have felt differently than I did.