Two California men were caught on film threatening a Black utilities worker, nearly running him over with their trucks as they chased him out of their trailer park, a chilling video shows.
The disturbing footage of the incident is creating an uproar online and raising serious concerns about the safety of African-Americans who are required to canvass unfamiliar neighborhoods for their jobs.
The young man’s identity has not been confirmed, but he was dressed in a work uniform, complete with a photo ID badge for SFE California, an energy supplier known for its door-to-door sales methods.
As the man was doing his job, walking down a public street in the mobile home community, a large white truck suddenly swooped alongside him. The driver was already recording when he yelled out the window, “Dude, there’s been burglaries in here, and you’re making people paranoid.” He added, “Get the f*ck out of here! Now!”
After a few tense seconds, the man circled back in his truck and made more bizarre demands. “Where’s your partners?” he shouted from the driver’s seat. “Don’t come close to me! Where’s your partners?” he asked again, before calling him a “mother*cker” out of nowhere.
It appeared the driver made a move to punch him, and the startled Black worker stepped back just as the man revved his engine and began closing in on him with his truck. Soon, another white truck-driving resident pulled up, bearing a warning to leave, and the worker walked even faster toward the exit.
“This is comedy to me, ain’t gonna lie,” he laughed, trying to make light of a potentially life-threatening situation. “I’m trying to get up out of here for they got two trucks following me, they ready to lynch me.”
Viewers immediately thought of another similar incident, one that ended in tragedy: The 2020 slaying of 25-year-old Ahmaud Arbery, who was jogging through a Brunswick, Georgia, suburb when he was chased down by three white men in vehicles, cornered, and fatally shot.
“This is called harassment as well as vehicular threatening and they should be charged!!!!” wrote a concerned commenter. Echoing many others, another person stated, “That poor young man. Can we get a GoFundMe or something to get him a car so he doesn’t have to walk?! I want him SAFE.”
At this point, the young worker has not been identified, and it’s unclear which community this was in. That said, civil rights attorney Lee Merritt, who posted the video on Dec. 10, assured viewers that “SFPD” (San Francisco Police Department) is involved, and police are investigating this as a racially-motivated incident.
“A young Black man. On his way to work. Chased by two white men in trucks who decided he looked ‘suspicious,’” Merritt wrote in the caption. “When will we be allowed to simply exist?”
