Man Said Police Roughly Detained Him, Broke Phone After Recording Arrest
A Brighton man said he was detained and roughly handled by a Boston police officer Wednesday night after stopping to videotape an arrest near the I-93/I-90 interchange.
Max Bickford told Boston.com that the officer at the scene also briefly confiscated the cell phone he used to record the footage, which later broke on the sidewalk when the officer threw it back to him.
Bickford said he was riding mopeds with friends for a trip to Castle Island when traffic suddenly stopped for two men running into the street.
“I saw a man with a hood over his head running into traffic, and then I saw another man tackle that man onto the ground,’’ he said. “I decided to record it after I saw what appeared to be…the officer giving him a kick when he was already on the ground.’’
That alleged kick isn’t captured on the video, though the unidentified officer is seen confronting Bickford and grabbing the cell phone out of his hands:
Off-camera, Bickford said more than one officer insulted and “slammed’’ him onto the ground in handcuffs, refusing to provide their badge numbers for later identification. He was never arrested or charged with any crime.
“He was just insulting me in front of an entire crowd of people – ‘what do you think you are, a lawyer? you watch too much TV?’’’ Bickford said. “After I kept asking what I was being charged with — no one read me my rights — he said he was going to let me go.’’
Bickford said he wasn’t sure how to proceed, but was reluctant to file a suit with the department.
“I could spend time, effort trying to get them to replace my phone screen, but no one else would pay for it but me and other taxpayers in the end,’’ he said. “When I called the lieutenant to make a verbal complaint, I wanted reassurance that ‘this is something we don’t tolerate in our department, the officer made a mistake,’ and I would’ve said, ‘you know, thank you,’ and that would’ve been great.’’
“Instead it was like: ‘I’m going to try to make you feel stupid and justify what happened,’’’ he said.
A Boston Police department spokesperson said that the department’s internal affairs investigators were looking into the incident.
Recording police carrying out their duties in public is a constitutionally-protected right in Massachusetts, following a 2012 appeals court ruling that found Simon Glik was wrongfully arrested and prosecuted in 2007 for using his phone to record police as they arrested a man on Boston Common.
Glik accepted a $170,000 settlement from the city.
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