The same month a Pennsylvania police department released its policy banning chokeholds and “neck restraints” like the one that killed George Floyd, a police officer could be seen in viral video kneeling on a man's neck. The video shot from a witness' car shows three officers detaining the man, with one of them pressing his knee into the suspect's neck Saturday outside of St. Luke’s Sacred Heart Hospital, which is in Allentown, a city about 60 miles north of Philadelphia. “I thought we mattered,” someone could be heard screaming in the video of the encounter.
The incident led to a protest that prompted more than 100 people to march to the Allentown Police Department to demand answers Saturday night, according to WFMZ-TV. Allentown Mayor Ray O’Connell told protesters: "When I look at it, I think it's disturbing. I think we have to gather all the facts and information before we go forward."
Police Chief Glenn Granitz Jr. similarly responded to protesters. "We're going to take a look at it," he said. "We're going to go through everything and we're going to give you an update as soon as we can." The officers in the video haven’t been identified yet, and it’s unclear what prompted them to arrest the man held on the ground with his face on the pavement.
”Just last week, the Allentown Police Department praised themselves for releasing their use of force policy,” the group Black Lives Matter to Lehigh Valley said in a Facebook post. “No sooner than a week after the APD released this policy, a police officer was viewed applying the same use of force, knee to the neck, procedure that killed George Floyd. At approximately 6:45 this evening, there was a situation in front of St Lukes Hospital, Sacred Heart campus. WE DEMAND ANSWERS! What good is a use of force policy if Allentown lives will still be disregarded?! It is clear and evident that black and brown lives DO NOT matter to the city of Allentown!”
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump echoed the group’s call to action in a tweet Sunday. “We need this officer’s name and badge # NOW,” Crump said in the tweet.
Justan Parker, an activist who leads Black Lives Matter to Lehigh Valley, told CBS Philly Allentown has a history with police brutality that he believes has inspired demonstrators to take to the streets in protest. "People think that it couldn't happen here, and it has been happening. And it has happened again yesterday, so enough is enough," he said.
A county judge earlier criticized the Allentown Police Department after Officer Jose Lebron was seen on body-cam video brutalizing a man who complained to authorities about the language officers used to describe the community. Lehigh County Judge Maria Dantos acquitted the injured man, John Perez of resisting arrest and disorderly conduct charges Feb. 21, 2020. “You perjured yourselves. You escalated a situation without cause,” Dantos said to officers. “Stand at this jury, laughing at the defense attorney, high-fiving in the hallway after testimony as if there were something, anything, to be proud of here. Cops smirking on the--You, Officer Lebron, shoved Mr. Perez because you were mad, period.”
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