This afternoon I went to South Hayward BART station. When I reached trackside, a train was stopped in the station, and a handful of Hayward police were present (more soon showed up; but, I think, no BART police).
A large Black man in handcuffs was objecting on the grounds that he had not been on the train, and appealed to me to confirm that I had just seen him outside, and that we talked about my umbrella.
I had indeed chatted with a Black man outside the station, while folding my umbrella. [DELETED]
I could not honestly say what the man at the ticket machine looked like, except that he was Black, taller than average, and about the same age as the suspect detainee (whom I’ll henceforth call Tom for convenience). Was he wearing short whiskers, a red/white shirt and a red windbreaker? I think so, but cannot be sure.
Tom could have invented the umbrella story and got lucky. But if he could summarize the rest of our conversation, then I’d be willing to swear that he had been outside the station with me a moment before.
I approached Tom and his police escort, a smallish White man with slick dark hair, whom I’ll call Dick because his name is none of my business.
Dick was asking Tom for his name. Tom said only that he’d be happy to answer any questions if Dick would take the cuffs off. Seems fair, if perhaps unwise. Dick offered to arrest Tom for having no name. (The casual observer might be misled by the handcuffs to think Tom was under arrest, but in fact he was only ‘detained’, as more than one cop reminded me. Whatever that means.)
I tried to tell Dick my idea; he said Tom’s troubles were none of my business. As a concerned citizen, I took exception to that; and soon we were shouting at each other. (Dick’s badge number, by the way, is also none of my business.) Eventually Dick threatened to arrest me for interfering, and went so far as to raise his whip-stick.
(“Come and see the violence inherent in the system!”)
Another cop, whom I’ll call Harry, had moved away and now drifted back toward us. (Harry is somewhat heavier than Dick, with lighter or thinning hair.) I took my case somewhat incoherently to Harry, who let me in on the big secret: “We are investigating <drumroll> a rape!” Well, that had no bearing on my burning question (why, when you come to intercept a man on a train, do you show less than no interest in evidence that the man you got was never on the train?); but it was a change from stonewalling, so I mistook it for an answer, and sat down.
My head was throbbing. Hoping to calm myself down a bit, I moseyed toward the other end of the station. There I met some more cops, recent arrivals who were guarding a staircase. I told one of them that Tom claimed he wasn’t on the train, and recounted my conversation at the ticket machine. Another cop, with a mustache and a yellow jacket, who seemed to outrank the others (but never went near Tom), told me (twice) that I did not know the whole story, that Hayward PD did not know the whole story because the incident in question happened in a-noth-er jur-is-dic-tion, and that they were waiting for more information to arrive before proceeding further. They did not know whether they were looking for someone on the train or not.
Well then, I thought later, you don’t know enough to dismiss my story as irrelevant. So why didn’t anyone so much as take my telephone number?
I am not a quick thinker in Real Life, and I made some mistakes. The worst was to approach Dick in the first place, when other cops were standing around. (A natural mistake: to aim for the obvious focus.) Second was to raise my voice when Dick did.
What would you do?