This afternoon I drove to Prairie View, Texas, to find out precisely where the July 10 Sandra Bland arrest occurred, and to photograph the area. This tragedy occurred near where I live, and I had to do something, no matter how trivial. All we see in the video are rather low resolution pictures, and some confusion has surrounded exactly where it all went down.
It was a beautiful, clear summer day. Strolling around the area, I momentarily dreamed of an alternative, better reality, rather than the brutal one we actually live in; one where Sandra was somewhere nearby, smiling, enthused about getting ready for the third week of her new job, making new friends, learning new things. Building a life.
I hated having to leave that dream.
Sandra Bland's fatal encounter with Texas State Trooper Brian Encinia began on University Drive on the campus of Prairie View A&M University, a historically black college where Bland was about to start work. This is a beautifully pastoral campus set in a quiet rural area, with a lake, hundreds of trees and fine landscaping. Nothing about this tranquil setting suggests the least hint of any violence. The campus does not just contain the university. H.T. Jones' Elementary School sits directly to the right of Encinia at this point in the video. So the whole area is an oasis for black children and young adults.
Sandra first appears in the video at the 1:17 mark running a stop sign to Encinia's left. She was new on campus, had her mind on other things, and simply didn't notice the stop sign. And yet, paradoxically, Encinia never mentions this during the arrest. Did he not notice it? It happened right in front of him. Here is a screenshot from the video with Sandra's car on the left:
Whatever his other sins, I think we can safely say Encinia was not racially profiling Sandra Bland. This incident occurred right outside a majority black campus, in a 93% African-American town. It wasn't like Bland was viewed as some strange intruder in a white neighborhood.
Here is the spot where Encinia is parked at the beginning of the video:
The tall building in the background at the beginning of the video is the John Coleman Library, Prairie View's student library:
There is also a Texas historical marker to the right of Encinia, in front of the campus information building:
The sign you see at the right in the video is a campus direction sign. As you can see, most of Prairie View's buildings are west of University Drive, which was why Sandra was coming from that direction, driving down
T.R. Solomon Road and turning right onto University at 1:17 in the video.
The stop sign that Sandra drove through:
Encinia makes a U-turn because going north on University takes you to the library and a few other campus buildings. He had no reason to remain on campus. He had not been on campus when he started to pull over the first person in the video.
The pastoral view to Encinia's left at the beginning of the video:
After making the U-turn at 1:25 in the video, Encinia follows Bland south on University Boulevard past the intersection of
State Loop 1098/Owens Road. At this point, they both leave the campus, and University Drive turns into
Farm Road 1098 South. (This has caused some confusion, because a Highway 290 sign is also visible shortly afterwards. But it is simply a sign pointing to 290. They are not
on 290.) Here's a screenshot from the video:
Here's a better photo of the same intersection:
The FM 1098 sign on the right at 1:49 in the video:
View of the intersection from the south:
A bar/restaurant called Wingarita at
736 University Drive sits to the left of the intersection from Encinia's point of view (a house sits to the right). It wasn't open today.
Here is the view from the sidewalk just past the intersection. A hotel is visible on the left. It is around this point that Sandra committed the horrific crime of not using her turn signal:
Right before this spot is a sign pointing to an Episcopal Church down the first street to the right. This being Texas, there are churches on every other block:
At 2:15 in the video, Sandra comes to a stop on the road. She is at
713 FM 1098 South in Prairie View, Texas. Screenshot:
Directly to her right is a shuttered bar/restaurant called "The Pit":
The next building over is the
Hope A.M.E. Church.It is from this church parking lot that the initial video of Sandra, taken by a bystander, was released:
And here is the place (not visible in the dashcam video) where Encinia slammed Sandra's head to the ground and tried to dehumanize her:
The nearby tree is now a memorial:
The scene looking north, back toward the Prairie View campus, from the spot where she was arrested:
(The "Signal lane change or sheriff may kill you" sign is no longer up along this stretch of highway.)
Directly across FM 1098 from the arrest site is the Amistad Bookplace.
As I was leaving town, I noticed this sign. I wondered if Sandra ever got to see it: