Councilman Jumaane Williams Says He Was Arrested at West-Indian Parade Because He’s Black

NY Daily News

City Councilman Jumaane Williams

A city councilman detained by cops at the West Indian Day parade said Tuesday that it wouldn’t have happened if he was white.

And Councilman Jumaane Williams (D-Brooklyn) blasted claims from the NYPD that the confrontation turned physical as a “bald-faced lie.”

“Some comments were made by the NYPD saying that a punch was thrown,” said Williams, who was handcuffed by police along with a top aide to Public Advocate Bill de Blasio while entering a restricted area on his way to a Brooklyn Museum reception after the parade.

“That saddens me,” Williams said of a statement released late Monday by NYPD spokesman Paul Browne who said a police captain at the scene had been punched by an “unknown individual.”

“Telling a bald-faced lie, particularly to the people that they’re lying about disturbs me,” Williams said. “How can we take seriously what the police will say in the future if they will lie to us about this. I defy the police to find one shred of evidence of any police officer punched in that incident.”

Williams and de Blasio aide Kirsten John Foy held a press conference outside City Hall Tuesday to denounce the incident – and call for policy changes in the NYPD.

“We do have to acknowledge that if I did not look the way I look – young, black, with [dread] locks and earrings … we are sure that things would have been handled differently,” said Williams.

“The vast majority of people who would disagree with this statement are not black and Latino.”

One elected official even went so far as to compare civil rights in New York to South African Apartheid.

“Each and every day, we’re hearing more and more about the violation of civil liberties in this town,” said U.S. Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-Brooklyn).

“We are quickly moving to an apartheid situation here in the city of New York where we don’t recognize the civil liberties and the civil rights of all New Yorkers.”

She noted that she was considering taking her concerns to the U.S. Department of Justice.

13 Comments

  • nonsense

    99.99% of the people at the parade were black. Was every arrested that day racially motivated?

    Why must the race card be played every time an elected black man gets arrested?

  • Hypocrisy!

    These lawless people are complaining about lawlessness! Look at their lives, look at how they trample on the rights of upstanding citizens, with their drugs, loud music, and theft. So it seems this is how it works; they can do whatever they want, and if someone blinks an eye, they scream bloody murder. Why don’t they begin focusing their efforts on civility within their community and then start complaining about inequality. Oh wait, then they won’t have to because people will treat them normally.

  • Aha, I get it!

    So anytime a person is assaulted by a black person, they should be invited to identify the perpetrator from a line up of a black man, an asian, a hispanic, and a Jew, and let’s see who is picked…

  • ce

    there were only black people there, mainly. If he did something, then he got a result from it. He had to have done something to get that, why would the police bother otherwise….don’t give me that : young, black, with [dread] locks and earrings bit, they had only enough time to deal with those who were acting up. He had to have acted up.

  • duh!

    Of course race played a part…all the people arrested for the shooting at the parade were black! I did not see any pictures of white people getting arrested for killing innocent people.
    Not all Muslims are terrorist. But, all terrorists are Muslims.

  • playing the race card

    Right because he was the ONLY black man and so they arrested all the blacks!

  • Yeah right

    Let’s see- a guy in dreadlocks at a West Indian Day prade complains he was arrested because he had dreadlocks and was block. Anyone that defensive has got to be guilty!

  • ch resident

    well then let him be heard and fight that they stop the labor day parade and the whole stupidity of labor day for once and for all

  • hes right

    of course he is right..he wouldnt have been arrested at the west indian day parade…because WHITE people dont go there. Its for the black people of the carrebaen islands…

  • DUH - parade-s got to end

    humm… he was handcuffed by police … while entering a restricted area on his way to a Brooklyn Museum reception after the parade.

    So, what’s a nice young, black, with [dread] locks and earrings city councilman doing in a restricted area? Doesn’t he know better that that?

    BTW any photos of the arrest? Just wondering is he was wearing a shirt and jacket at the time