A South Carolina police department has released shocking body cam footage of two police officers aggressively arresting a 13-year-old boy who was selling flowers outside of a local Walmart.
Officers Dante Ghi and Katherine Kirkland were shown on video forcefully arresting the young boy at a Walmart on April 1 in Summerville, South Carolina. The body camera footage began by showing the officers asking the boy for his photo I.D., despite him being just 12, and requesting he show a business license. The boy then asked why he needed to show the documentation, and Ghi responded, “You’re getting ready to go to jail, is why.”
Officer Ghi proceeded to grab the boy’s arm and attempted to force his head down between his legs to restrain Him. Officer Kirkland claimed that the boy hit her in the face and caused the struggle, but State Rep. Martin Pendarvis, a representative of the boy’s family, said that there was no way the 13-year-old boy would have punched Kirkland.
Pendarvis said in a statement, “What you see is (his left hand) handcuffed, and the other officer has him subdued and engaged with his right hand. It’s hard to conclude, in my mind, that there would have been time (to strike) this officer.”
Kirkland and Ghi claimed that the teenage boy was “uncooperative” and “confrontational.” However, videos of the incident showed Ghi pushing the young boy’s head down between his legs while Kirkland handcuffed him. Kirkland audibly threatened to taser the boy while Ghi shoved him into the ground outside the Walmart.
The Summerville Police LtShaun Tumbleston explained that Ghi allegedly used a “grappling motion to prevent the [boy] from standing up and to prevent the risk of the individual trying to escape or assault another police officer.”
The 13-year-old boy was since charged with assaulting an officer for the incident, but Pendarvis said the boy sells rose-shaped flowers in front of the Walmart to make an “honest buck.”
“This was an overreaction. This was an escalation. There was no attempt to try to de-escalate the event from the time that they approached him.”
The representative continued, “It’s not uncommon, whether it’s Girl Scouts or church groups or little league groups, to gather in front of storefronts, selling cookies, selling lemonade, selling whatever, to make an honest buck, to raise money for particular situations. If there were Girl Scouts set up there, would the results have been the same?”
Since the release of the body camera footage, the Summerville community has come together to protest the treatment of the boy by officers Ghi and Kirkland.
