Police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, are conducting an internal investigation after officers placed the wrong man under arrest at an Applebee’s restaurant in July but ended up charging him for resisting arrest anyway, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported Wednesday.
When a hit-and-run occurred on a nearby freeway around 11 p.m. local time on July 20, witnesses told law enforcement that two Black men and a woman with a child had fled the scene on foot in the direction of an Applebee’s, according to the outlet.
Officers looking to apprehend them instead confronted a different Black man, woman and baby seated at Applebee’s and forcefully put the man in handcuffs. Meanwhile, the people the police were actually looking for were later found in the restaurant’s bathroom.
Authorities nonetheless charged both the man and woman who were seated in the restaurant with disorderly conduct, resisting and obstructing an officer. The woman received an additional charge of possession of marijuana.
Bystander video of the incident made its rounds on social media after a Facebook user posted it on Aug. 4. “Kenosha has been doing super shady stuff lately and [they’re] trying to cover this up,” the user wrote.
In the bystander footage, the interrupted restaurant patron could be heard protesting, “I’m not doing shit! Let me the fuck go!” as police cornered him next to a table. He held on to the crying baby as officers tried to pry the child from him. One officer grabbed the baby and two others tackled him. As the man lay facedown on the floor, an officer punched him repeatedly near or on his head while the other held the man’s hands behind his back.
The woman can be heard in the background of the video calling out for her child, but she was not captured on video.
“Where the fuck is my child?” she shouted. The baby can be heard crying in the background throughout the video.
“The male was being detained as the crash was being investigated. The male attempted to leave against [officers’] orders and was restrained. He resisted and the incident that was caught on camera unfolded from there,” police told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
The Kenosha Police Department did not immediately respond to JS’s request for comment.
Kenosha activists have condemned the charges and the arrest. A group called Leaders of Kenosha held a press conference on Wednesday urging community members to reach out to their elected officials on the matter.
“The police officers, it just did not appear that they were using good judgment,” Tanya McLean, executive director and founder of the organization, said at the press conference. “We want to know why police officers are not being respectful to community members here in this city. What is it that makes you feel as if you need to be so overly aggressive? So confrontational?”
“Just a complete lack of regard for people that do not look like you, that don’t have that uniform on. What is it that just frightens you? Because we know that when people are fearful, they act in irrational ways,” McLean continued.
The Leaders of Kenosha did not immediately respond to JS’s request for comment. The Kenosha mayor’s office declined JS’s request for comment.