When Was the First Time the Police Pulled a Gun on You?

I was a 20-year-old college student in New York City.

How old were you the first time a police officer pulled a gun on you? I was a 20-year-old college student in New York City.

There are things I cannot forget. The sight of the cold, black steel weapons pointed at my head. The clinched teeth, tense arms and angry words of the cops. The piercing jolt of pure fear that shot through my veins and parked in my soul.

Am I about to die? Me?

I know so many of my black and brown friends and loved ones — along with so many others around the country — have had at least one frightening episode with police. I know that for every George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Freddie Gray, Sam DuBose, Philando Castile, Alton Sterling, Walter Scott, Tamir Rice, Michael Brown and Eric Garner, there are thousands of other stories from people you don’t know.

So, my question is simple and sincere: how close have you come to being one of them? How much did your pleas of innocence, your panicked efforts to de-escalate and your silent prayers end up being the only tools you had to save your own life?

How much did you wonder, why me?

Why do so many people of color from diverse backgrounds, professions, education and income levels all share eerie nightmares of police terror? Why us?

I recently asked the question on my Facebook page. The responses, the threads of fear and panic, the very different yet frighteningly similar stories, wove together a sturdy fabric of indiscriminate intimidation.

One friend was swarmed by police while walking home, alone, from the Boys and Girls Club. He was 11. Another friend was 19 when, after dropping off his dad to work, police stuck a “shotgun in my face” and pulled him out of the car. It was, they later told him, a case of mistaken identity.

Another friend was 14, sitting in her own home. Still another, also a female, said she was driving to a church member’s home when police mistook her for a man, pulled her over, accused her of “suspicious driving” and “literally pointed [a gun] at my head.”

Out of the dozens of responses, only a handful said they hadn’t pleaded their innocence on the other side of a police gun. As for me, my own situation was equally fraught with fear.

I remember as if it happened yesterday. It was late 1990’s. I was a student at NYU, living in a cluster of university apartments in the West Village off Bleecker Street. After a long day of classes and studying, I’d returned to my apartment, in the evening, exhausted. I wanted to settle in for the night — maybe study more, eat and watch television. But I needed some things from the nearby drug store.

My building was one of those classic New York behemoths, carved into boxes and built toward the sky to pack in as many dwellers as possible in overcrowded New York City. The elevator was always busy, so going and coming took some patience and willpower. But I needed whatever I needed at the time. So, I changed out of my school clothes and slipped on some sneakers, sweatpants and a hoody and headed to the drug store.

Outside, it felt like a typical New York evening, bustling but uniquely beautiful. The day hadn’t darkened yet, though accumulating clouds threatened rain. I walked a few blocks down to Love’s Drugs, a popular chain of discount drug stores in Manhattan that New Yorkers nicknamed, “Love the Drugs.”

I don’t remember what I bought but I do remember it wasn’t enough that I needed a bag. With my items easily carried in my hands, I left the store anxious to get back to my apartment to unwind. But as I walked back, the clouds began to honor their threat, spritzing light drops of moisture. Without an umbrella, I put on my hoodie. With such a short distance, I knew I could race the rain. So, I began to jog.

Virtually the moment I made it back to my building, out of nowhere, two police cars raced in, sirens blaring. A swarm of officers emerged, storming me. Their semicircle of guns promised quick solutions to any wrong moves I might make.

In my 20 years of life, I’d never been on the other end of a gun let alone several of them. How do you react in a situation in which there is no warning and no training?

It was clear they presumed I was a threat. But their shouted questions proved they weren’t sure I was a threat.

“STOP — DON’T MOVE!!!!”

“WHERE ARE YOU COMING FROM!??!”

Confused and yes — frightened — I remember strangely looking at them, thinking, “WHO are you screaming at? It CAN’T be me.”

I pleaded my innocence. But perhaps my pleadings seemed like resistance because, in a flash, one officer grabbed me, wrangled my arms behind my back — and slammed me to the hood of the police car.

“I didn’t do anything!” I yelled. “I go to NYU! I live in this building!”

If you’ve never been in this situation, it’s important to note that during those furious, sudden moments, it’s hard to process and respond to everything being shouted at you. But I remember the officer screaming, “What do you have in your hands?!?!”

I’d forgotten about my bagless drugstore items. One of the things I’d purchased: a fingernail clipper.

To this day, I don’t know if that tiny object in my hand caused the assail. More likely, it was my being a sizable black man. In a hooded sweatshirt. Jogging in the West Village. Face partly covered. On a predominantly white university campus. Running up to a high-rise building.

Being black.

Before long, one of the officers dug into my pockets, rifled through my wallet and saw my ID. Only then was my face freed from the hood of the car.

Realizing their blunder, the goon — who only seconds before had his gun pointed at me, who’d pinned me against the hot patrol car — had a ready “explanation.”

“You fit the description of a suspect we’re looking for,” he said. And as the officers began to leave, he offered one more gem.

“It happens to the best of us.”

If you’re young, as I was, and never had anything like this happen, what do you do next? I should have gotten their names and badge numbers. I should have collected eyewitness accounts. I should have immediately gone to the police station to file a complaint. And in an age pre-dating social media, I should have drawn some measure of attention to the unnecessary aggression, somehow.

But, I am ashamed to say, I did none of that. Once I was finally back on my feet, I saw a small group of gawkers from my building who’d watched the whole thing. Some strangers. Some acquaintances. All in silence. No one said to the police, “He lives here! You have the wrong person!” No one asked if I was okay.

Through some form of mental perversion, where the innocent adopts the guilt, I felt embarrassed and ashamed. Desperate to escape the indicting weight of my neighbors’ stares, I ran inside and retreated to my apartment.

Alone, safe, I cried. Uncontrollably. For me, it was a day that forever split time in two: the time before and the time after police pointed their guns at my soul.

Now, in this time after, we are all constantly reminded that these episodes could happen to anyone. It’s a lesson delivered in nonstop headlines, and in viral responses to social media posts. They are lessons informed by painful reflections and familiar memories.

Reading through the pain laid out by so many in my Facebook post, one white, former colleague wrote about his own run-in with police. He was 16 at the time, at a friend’s house. “We walked out of the garage to go to a bar about 1/2 a mile away when a cop walked out and stopped us,” he wrote. “I don’t think he had his gun drawn… but he scared the shit out of us.”

My Facebook friend went on. “My friend and I are white…and even though it was very suspicious two teenagers sneaking out of an otherwise empty house [the police officer] did nothing. Until I read this post I never realized how lucky I’ve been.”

Which is, of course, the point of my original question. Asking, “How old were you the first time the police pulled a gun on you?” painfully anticipates that so many people of color can actually answer it. Asking the question demonstrates how common it is for us. Asking the question separates an experience that simply scares the shit out of you from one that makes you scared for your life. And, hearing stories of police intimidation from my friends, students, doctors, lawyers, business people, professionals, church-goers and regular, law-abiding people, combats the ridiculous notion that the police only harass — or attack — those guilty “thugs.”

These times call for action informed by awareness. But, they also call for a harsh reality check. Police often pull their weapons on people of color. And sometimes, they pull the trigger.

We cannot allow this happen to your brother, or sister, or father, or mother, or son, or daughter, or friend. Or you. We can and must do better.