Photo: Twitter
He appears distressed in the video.
By Dan O'Reilly — Written on Apr 20, 2022
Syracuse police are facing some backlash after a video surfaced appearing to show them handcuffing a young child who appears to be distressed.
Those who have seen the video online expressed outrage over the possible trauma the young boy could face from the incident.
The video shows Syracuse police detaining the 8-year-old boy for allegedly stealing.
The boy allegedly took a bag of chips from a convenience store without paying.
Kenneth Jackson recorded an incident where he saw a boy being taken to a patrol car by Syracuse police officers.
All of the details of the situation are not fully known yet, but Jackson got into a heated argument with the officers over the treatment of the child.
Kenneth initially addressed the officer that was taking the child over to the cruiser, asking what they were doing.
The officer curtly responded, “Guess, guess what I’m doing.” After the two go back and forth briefly, another officer steps in and explains that the boy was “stealing stuff.”
As the officer tries to ask if Jackson would want the police to intervene if the child had broken into his house, Jackson interrupts, saying, “Nah man, so he's stealing a bag of chips you're treating him like an old cold f***ing killer?”
Police say that the child was not arrested and was taken home by officers.
Once the video started making the rounds on social media, Mayor Walsh responded in a statement defending police, saying, “The officer knew the child from prior interactions and explained to him that he was being taken home."
"The officers returned the child to his family and discussed the incident with his father before leaving without filing any charges.”
According to Syracuse police, the child was found stealing in a local store and was placed in the back of the squad car, and was neither handcuffed nor arrested.
Emotions are high and people have been weighing in ever since the video started going viral.
The image of a crying black child has evoked a lot of strong imagery for a lot of different people who see the viral video and believe that they are seeing police officers acting inappropriately.
A lot of these takes seem to be missing the full context of the situation, believing that the child was handcuffed (which does not appear to be the case in the video) and arrested.
However, there is no doubt that the young boy is very distressed in the video.
Jackson has spoken out about his role in filming and questioning the police officers about how they handled the child, “I had to because, at that moment, I’m looking around and there was no one besides myself… no one was actually intervening.”
Dan O'Reilly is a writer who covers news, politics, and social justice. Follow him on Twitter.