I was arrested and charged with a Class 1 Misdemeanor this past Sunday in Richmond Virginia during a peaceful #BlackLivesMatter march. We were marching through the streets protesting after Governor Ralph Northams Executive Order 64 that imposed an 8pm curfew.
I believe this order to have been a move to inimidate us, suppress our rights to free speech, and an attempt by the state to document and contact trace protestors.
After gasing the peaceful protest because of an imposed curfew... we were cornered by an officer in a small plaza. He stepped out of his car and said “I’m sick of your snowflake bullshit” and to “go back to your basements”. We asked if we were free to go home and he said we were.
We were escorted down the street by a marked unit. As we rounded a corner we were met by armed riot police/national guard (I’m not really sure which it was) at which point we were arrested on mass. (233 total that night!) We were not mirandized.
Once we were removed from our paddy wagon in the parking garage of the sheriffs office, the officers placed us on a bus. I was one of the first placed on the vehicle and within the hour it was full of over 26 #rva26 protestors almost all of which were under the age of 30.
I was sitting over the engine block and by the end of my time on the bus my feet felt as if they were being burned by a skillet. I was held on the bus for upwards of five hours with some people being held for upwards of ten.
Over that time the police lost track of both my property as well as the forms they had me fill out. Once my belongings were found we were finally brought into the station. After our vitals were taken and we answered some medical questions, the officers strip searched us.
After the strip search, I went through a full body scan. This was not merely an XRay scan, but rather, a scan that shows you nude. I heard a fellow arrestee say they saw that one of the women being scanned had their officer disgustingly ogling at them.
They then took a full body photograph of me. At this point we were moved to a holding area to wait to see a magistrate and receive our bond. We then discovered they only had two magistrates working.
I had a dialogue with some of the officers and it became evident they were split either uninterested in having an open discussion about the issues, or that they were simply unable to speak out because of their body cams.
I began to call their actions that night fascist and a certain officer told me that “after you walk through those doors [to the booking room] I’m going to make your life very difficult”.
Once I saw the magistrate and received my 1500 dollar bond for a Class 1 Misdemeanor, I was informed they only needed to take my mugshot and fingerprint me and I’d be released.
At this point that officer also told me “do not sit with, do not look at, and do not talk to those women out there” I asked why and he said “I know what I’d do to those fine ladies out there if I was in your position” and I told him that was crazy problematic
He responded “what? You’d fuck an ugly bitch?” When I was taken aback and stunned by his lack of any kind of respect for women, he said “yeah exactly that’s what I thought”. Officer I need you to known as on the record. You did not own me there. You played yourself.
After about an hour and a half I was finally booked and I assumed I would be released shortly. It was about 5:30am at this point. Officer Sexual Harrassment reappeared and he told me to follow him. I thought I was being released so I complied. He then threw me in a solitary cell.
Throughout this process I had asked multiple times for a phone call and had been told I would receive it later. Before I stepped in the cell I once again requested the phone call. He laughed and told me to get in the cell. I began to bang on the viewport and demand a phone call.
After some time, I managed to get the attention of one of the young women waiting to get her photo taken. She flagged down a female officer and they both began to walk towards my cell. They then passed me and she threw her in the cell next to me.
The girl began to panic and as the officer walked away she asked the other arrestees “who else wants to be a troublemaker?” The girl began to panic and they eventually removed her after about a half hour.
I asked the officer the time and they told me it was around 6:15 in the morning. On several more instances I asked an officer the time and for a phone call and every time I received an answer in regard to the time it would jump around through chronologically.
I requested a phone call again and they said they’d check on it. Anytime I’d try to get their attention again they’d ignore me or laugh. I tried the intercom to ask for a call and an officer said “you ain’t gunna get it, sit in there and think about what you’ve done”.
Later in the evening a guy was put in the cell across from me. He was visibly agitated and I tried to figure out what was wrong. I could hear him screaming in his cell “they peppered sprayed my dick! They pepper sprayed my fucking dick when they strip searched me!”
He would continue to scream in pain for around 4 hours while officers laughed at him as they walked by. The man only received medical attention after he threatened to kill himself.
After hours of asking for a phone call I began to panic and ask when I’d be released. An officer told me it would be within an hour. Several hours later and I had not been released. I didn’t know what time it was and I still hadn’t called my family to tell them I was locked up.
They also denied lawyers, family and friends access to the facility. My girlfriend and friends called around to different precincts to see if I had gotten arrested but it was a loop of lines to call with no answers. After the hellish night, I was finally released at 1:30PM
This show of authoritianism by RCPD cannot and should not go unpunished. These are the exact conditions we are out here protesting. If this is how they treat people breaking curfew in the jail system I’d hate to see how they treat people they’d usually deem criminals!
It felt as if the police were using their time with us to literally physically and psychologically torture us and to take out their insecurities or whatever other repressed feelings they may have had towards us
Bottom line. Richmond city police is a disgusting kkklub that needs real oversight and demilitarization. This treatment of non violent protestors will not break us. We will not go back to our basements, and we will not be dissuaded from speaking our minds. #richmondprotest
