A California Black man who was pulled over earlier this month because his license plate light was not working ended up detained for 40 minutes, where he was accused of hiding marijuana in his daughter’s backpack and ordered out of the car because he was a registered gun owner.
The Fresno police officers also threatened to break his window because he did not roll it down far enough to their satisfaction.
Ryan Coley recorded the traffic stop on his phone on Nov. 8, posting the video to YouTube the following day, where it was picked up by Abiyah Israel, a former cop turned activist who runs the We the People University YouTube channel.
“This video is extremely frustrating, the more you watch this video, the more frustrated you may become,” Israel said in his video.
“They go from violating this guy’s rights, extending the stop, wanting to search his child’s book bag, wanting him to exit the vehicle, (then) when he wants to exit the vehicle, they block him inside the vehicle, then they search him, hands on his head,” Israel continued. “You will see what I mean so just be prepared to see some extremely, extremely ignorant police.”
In a telephone interview with Atlanta Black Star, Coley explained that the cop who pulled him over had been watching him while he was sitting in the parking lot of a Fresno smoke shop waiting for a friend to get off work.
“He comes by my car in his car and shines the light inside my vehicle for a very long time,” Coley said. “He then parked his car across the street at the liquor store with his lights off.”
Coley watched the cop park his car but didn’t think much of it since he was not breaking any law, nor did he have anything illegal in his car.
But when his friend got off work about 40 minutes later and stepped into his own car, Coley began following him, which was when the cop pulled out of the parking lot and pulled him over for the missing license plate light.
But rather than write him the ticket and allow him to be on his way, the officer detained him for 40 minutes, which Coley believes would never have happened if he were white.
“It would have been totally different for a white guy,” he said. “He targeted me because he’d seen me earlier at the smoke shop.”
Coley said he did not begin recording until about eight minutes into the traffic stop when he realized the cop was fishing for any excuse to arrest him.
The Traffic Stop
The video begins with the cop insisting he had seen marijuana inside Coley’s daughter’s backpack but not in the car during the traffic stop.
At first, Coley refused to open the backpack of the 7-year-old — who was not in the car —telling the cop to just write him the citation over the license plate light and allow him to be on his way.
But the cop refused to let him go, so Coley asked to speak to the officer’s sergeant, but the cop continued demanding to see the backpack – even though the cop informed Coley that “having weed is not illegal” in California.
“He was trying to get me to criminally incriminate myself, first with the marijuana bag,” he said. “If I would have said yes, there’s a little marijuana in there, that would have been the procedure to get me out of my car.”
“The second one was the gun charge,” he said. “If I would have said it’s locked up in my back trunk, which is legal, that would have been another procedure to search my car.”
The cop threatened to arrest him if he did not step out of his car.
“We don’t need any reason to pull you out,” the cop said. “If I want, I can pull you out.”
Even though he knew his rights, Coley said he eventually complied with the cop’s orders to avoid getting arrested.
“I didn’t want to spend the weekend in jail,” he said. “I got kids, man.”
First, he opened his daughter’s backpack to show the cop that the alleged marijuana was nothing more than some arts and crafts his daughter had been working on in school.
He then complied by stepping out of the car, but the cop stopped him from getting out of the car on his own, acting as if he was in fear for his life because he was a registered gun owner.
“He first reached into my car to open my vehicle without my permission,” Coley said. “Then he got me out of the car with my hands on my head and he patted me down.”
However, the fact that his gun is registered with the state shows he is a law-abiding citizen because the state conducts background searches on people attempting to register their guns, forbidding people with prior felony or misdemeanor domestic violence arrests from legally possessing guns.
Nevertheless, the cop patted him down in the hopes of finding a concealed weapon, which would not be allowed since he does not have a concealed weapons permit.
Coley said he was allowed to leave with a citation for the license plate light, which he intends to fight in court because all he needs to do is buy a new light and show the judge.
But he said he would like to take legal action over the long detainment but has been unable to find an attorney. He also said the traffic stop left him traumatized, and he is now afraid to drive his car.
“Fresno has bad cops, and I don’t want to be harassed,” he said. “I may have dreads in my hair, but I’m not a gangbanger.”
