A teenager arrested for crossing a red light had the final say after a judge dismissed his ridiculous case.
The 17-year-old was standing on the doorstep with friends in the suburb of Dunleith on June 29 this year when the group realised that the police were about to approach them.
Perhaps sensing something was wrong, he picked up his phone and began filming the interaction, capturing the moment when two officers pulled up to the group.
In the clip, an officer can be heard aggressively demanding that they stop and show identification, but is reluctant to say why. Within just one minute, the teen is arrested.
Though he somehow retaliated when a judge later dismissed the case, the teen’s mother has since labeled the officer’s behavior “completely insane.”
A black teenager from Delaware was stopped by police officers while walking down the street
A group of black friends were walking down the street in Dunleith, a suburb of Wilmington, when they were “randomly” stopped
Video footage shows multiple patrol cars pulling up next to the group of teens. An officer can then be heard shouting, “Stop, boys, stop!”
When the teen asks why he’s being pulled over, the officer simply repeats his command: “I’m telling you to stop.”
“What are you stopping me for?” the teen asks again, before the officer responds, “If you don’t stop, you’re going to be arrested right now.”
The teen can be heard asking for clarification for the third time: “What are you trying to hold me for? … Tell us,” he demands.
“Stay where you are and relax. … At this time, we are arresting you for a pedestrian violation,” the officer responds before asking for identification.
“Pedestrian trespassing of what?” the teen asks.
But the officer’s patience quickly runs out and without warning he immediately pulls out his handcuffs to arrest the teenager.
“Okay, turn around and put your hands behind your back,” the officer orders.
When asked what he was being searched for, the agitated officer replied that he was being stopped as part of a “traffic stop.”
“You are currently being arrested for failing to cooperate with a traffic stop,” the officer says.
But the explanation seems far-fetched to the teen. “How can I conduct a traffic stop? I’m not in a vehicle, sir,” the teen replies.
The officer explained it was a “traffic stop” but changed his opinion to a “pedestrian stop”
Only one teenage member of the group was arrested and handcuffed by police
Despite his arrest for crossing a street where he was not allowed to, the teenager appears to have had the final say as charges against him were dismissed by a judge
“It’s called a pedestrian stop,” the officer replies.
But when the teen asks what exactly that means, the officer loses his patience.
“Would you just shut your f***ing mouth and let me explain this to you? You crossed the road without using the zebra crossing.”
The teenager was the only one from his group of friends to receive a ticket, but in the end the charges against him were dismissed by a judge.
“I don’t understand if he thought it would make me angry or what he thought it would cause,” the teen told Delaware Online. ‘I don’t know. I’m still in shock about it.’
The boy’s mother, Paula Wright, said the officer involved in the arrest was “deranged.”
“I think they’re completely crazy. To be honest, I think they’re the biggest gang in Delaware,” Wright said.
“The officer, that he gets out of the car and says, ‘Stop right there. Now give me your ID. I’m going to arrest you,’ What kind of approach is that?” she asks.
The police continue to maintain that they were right to arrest the group of youths, who were said to have behaved ‘recklessly’ and ‘suspiciously’.
“Officers observed the group running down New Castle Avenue without using a proper crosswalk. As they crossed the road, one of the individuals was observed running recklessly through heavy traffic, nearly causing an accident,” Senior Cpl. Richard Chambers said in a statement.
It was alleged that another teenager held his waistband, possibly to give others the impression he was carrying a weapon in his pants.
According to officers, two of the teens were also wearing “hoodies with the hoods up,” which also made officers suspicious.
“Officers found this strange as it was approximately 27 degrees Celsius,” the statement said.