Nov 7, 2023
Black Man Brutalized In Wrongful Arrest Gets $500K From City
- 10 minutes
Attorneys for Travis Price, a black man
who was wrongfully arrested more than two
years ago, say their client has come
to terms on a $500,000 settlement for
his lawsuit against the city of Rock Hill,
South Carolina.
For people that don't know,
Rock Hill, South Carolina is right
outside of Charlote, North Carolina.
It might as well be Charlote.
[00:00:16]
Per WCNC, Price settlement is one of
the largest in the city's history.
According to copy of the complaint of
Tamed by Atlanta Blackstar on June 23,
2021, Price was driving home
when he saw that his brother,
Ricky Price was being
arrested at a gas station.
[00:00:34]
He pulled into the parking lot and
approached where officers
were holding Ricky.
The officers ordered Price to stand by
while they removed Ricky's handcuffs so
they could give him his brother's jury.
This is according to
the Atlanta Black Star.
Simultaneously, according
to the complaint,
[00:00:50]
Rock Hill Officer Jonathan Moreno was
executing a search of Ricky's car.
When he finished,
he approached a group and
allegedly attacked Price without
cause of legal justification.
A bystanders video show Moreno on top of
Price while he is lying on the concrete.
[00:01:08]
The officers struggle to restrain Ricky,
who noticed what is
happening to his brother.
And this, of course,
is again according to Atlanta Blackstar.
And we actually have attained
some video about that.
So let's take a look at this video.
[00:01:29]
>> Speaker 2: This is how
Rocky will do you, y'all.
[NOISE] What is he
doing to him?
What is he doing to him?
I got it on camera.
I got it on camera.
He ain't doing nothing, y'all.
[00:01:46]
I don't care.
Look at this.
Look at this, y'all.
My God.
My God.
Look at this out.
Look at this.
He ain't doing nothing, y'all.
Look, he not doing nothing.
My God.
My God.
Somebody come help them.
[00:02:03]
He ain't even do.
Look at him, y'all.
Look at the police.
Look at the police.
He got him on a fight.
Travis is a good boy.
He is a good boy.
Look how they tasing him, y'all.
I'm getting closer.
Look how they beating his ass.
He ain't even doing that.
Get out for him.
[00:02:18]
Get out for him.
My God.
My God.
Get out for him.
He is beating him.
My God.
That's up,
they locking him up for nothing.
Y'all, look at this.
I'm glad I got it on live.
[00:02:33]
I got it online.
They gonna go down for this, y'all.
Look at his face.
My God, y'all.
Look at his face.
My God, look at his face y'all.
Y'all wrong for that.
[00:02:50]
>> Speaker 1: This is so ridiculous and
also so American.
The cameras don't stop them.
We know that.
We watched them choke George Floyd
with their knee on his neck and
[00:03:06]
their hands in their pocket.
And the movement that came
after it wasn't enough.
Because if you look at each year
since George Floyd's murder,
the police killing black men has went up.
What we just watched is gang style
beating sanctioned by the United States
[00:03:22]
government, in this case,
Rock Hill, South Carolina.
According to Atlanta Black Star,
Price was choked, physically assaulted,
slammed to the pavement with great force,
handcuffed and placed under arrest.
The complaints say throughout the assault,
[00:03:37]
Price attempted on multiple occasions to
inform Moreno that he was merely doing
what other city officers
had instructed him to do.
Price kept his hands in the air
in a non threatened manner,
and Price at no time attempted to, nor
did he make physical contact with
Moreno or any other officers.
[00:03:56]
Price stated that he was complying,
was not resisting arrest,
and he had not done anything wrong.
We watched that.
We know that.
Following the incident, Price was
charged with hindering police, but
was later cleared of wrongdoing.
However, per his lawsuit,
the city attempted to disparage
[00:04:15]
him in their statements about
the incident s it alleged,
he was uncooperative shut officers,
and yelled belligerently.
This is only telling of what the South,
what America believes black men can and
can't do.
[00:04:31]
Basically, you cannot stand up or
speak out against white men.
And when you do, even though he
wasn't yelling belligerently,
the fact that he was standing straight,
the fact that he would dare stop and
see why his brother's been arrested, all
of that is questioning establishment in
[00:04:48]
a way that makes him deserving of
the ass whipping we just watched.
Say what you want.
This is America.
This is commonplace.
This is commonplace.
And these videos don't stop it.
So all these people say,
at least we got videos of it.
We had videos of Bloody Sunday, y'all.
[00:05:03]
Bloody Sundays happened in the 60s.
We still got cops hitting people across
the head with knife stickers and
further punching them in their face,
beating them as if we are animals,
and in most cases, some cases,
shooting them to their dead.
Sharon, what do you say about this?
[00:05:19]
>> Speaker 5: Well, I'd start with this.
Look at how the conversation pivots,
even look at where they have a starting.
We're literally arguing over the fact,
or they want us to,
whether this black man was perfect
enough to not deserve a beating.
[00:05:34]
Wouldn't you be belligerent if you
were getting mixed signals, and
then they tased your ass.
Wouldn't you be belligerent?
This small city in South Carolina, and
you'd know better than I am, Mayor.
I don't know why I always think you're
the expert on everything in the South but
[00:05:50]
you know a lot.
They pride themselves.
They even have a mural in
front of the mercantile.
I think it is honoring the friendship
nine who sat in at that lunch counter.
All about desegregating things.
It was a test case, and
it picked up momentum from there.
And they had that mural.
[00:06:07]
No room for racism.
There's plenty.
Again, I don't fault the people
who wanna honor history and
brave people who came before them,
but there is plenty of room for
racism in Rock Hill because
we just watched it.
[00:06:22]
That's not an isolated incident.
That's not a misunderstanding.
When you beat the you know what out
of someone really on first sight,
that's what it's called, racism.
I don't believe a white woman
would be treated that way.
And nowhere in there did I say
they've never been treated that way.
[00:06:39]
I just mean it's commonplace for
us to have to deal with this.
Doing the right thing.
I wanna get to a place in America that I
don't know we'll get to in my lifetime,
or perhaps my daughters, where you
can actually do the wrong thing and
[00:06:55]
not get your ass beaten.
>> Speaker 1: Indeed, I mean and we see
instance where people do the wrong thing
and still don't get handled and
treated this way.
Unfortunately, they don't look like us.
But this is not it.
The city's false statements would
be reported by media outlets and
[00:07:11]
amplified by officials like
Representative Ralph Norman.
While Norman, who is also listed
as a defendant in the complaint,
updated his post days later, he failed to
retract his original defamatory statement,
which led to a wave of
comments attacking Price.
[00:07:26]
As for the officer Moreno,
he was fired from the department and
charged with third degree assault and
battery.
But a jury, of course,
a jury found him not guilty last year.
Listen to me, we have to remind people,
Sharon, on a regular basis.
[00:07:44]
And people may say Mundale is a broken
record when it comes to policing and
black bodies.
We have to remind people that
to be black in America and
interact with police officer is
almost a death sentence, surefire.
The fact that juries don't defend or
[00:08:00]
see guilt in what we just watched
is absolutely baffling to me.
Sharon, I'm gonna give it to
you before we go to break.
>> Speaker 5: Well, that's because
these juries are by and large,
looking for
ways to exonerate the indefensible.
[00:08:16]
They're actually looking for it.
And the civil rights lessons we learned,
the painful ones, Medgar Evers,
the rest, these are the lessons that
are being played out again today.
They're looking for
ways to clear white people because
our blood is not worth anything.
[00:08:34]
Black skin, black trauma is not as
important or even worth noting sometimes.
So, of course, walked free and
third degree assault.
Give me a break, really?
And the media, hey,
I had these fights all the time, Mayor.
All the time in the newsroom.
[00:08:50]
I just wanted to tell the truth.
And a police statement where someone's
convicted that they handed me across
the desk is not the truth.
It's an element that
needs to be qualified.
And we know too often police lie.
Yeah, I said it.
[00:09:06]
They do lie too often, not isolated,
as you said, not bad apples.
This is what we're working with.
>> Speaker 1: And I think it's
a shame that I need to say this, but
I had a confrontation this morning at
the poll that I was just sparked about.
Somebody told me that I show up as racist
because I point out the things that have
[00:09:24]
happened to black people in the past
as it pertains to white supremacy and
are still happening and
their connections between the two.
I wanna say this, and I don't normally
say this, if you are a white person and
you are offended that we are talking
about the policing system in this light,
[00:09:41]
and also all of the systems
that oppress black people and
other folk of color and
other minorities in this country.
I think you need to do a self check,
honestly,
because you may be harboring something.
What makes you believe that you
are responsible for the targeting and
[00:09:58]
harm that black people feel and
go through unless you are okay with it?
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