The mayor of Baton Rouge, Louisiana flatly denied claims police have contributed to the sharp divides in a city that recently witnessed the fatal police shooting of a black man and the slaying of three police officers.
“That’s bullshit,” Mayor Kip Holden told BuzzFeed News, after reporter Albert Samaha told him of residents’ complaints of racial profiling by local officers.
Alton Sterling, 37, was killed by police officers two weeks ago outside the convenience store where he often sold CDs to earn extra income. Cell phone video of the gruesome shooting sparked mass protests nationwide. Before the city had time to regroup, Gavin Long, a disturbed ex-Marine, ambushed a group of police officers on Sunday, shooting six of them and killing three.
In the aftermath of these jarring incidents, black residents told reporters from CNN, Buzzfeed and the Los Angeles Times about the long-simmering racial tensions in their southern river town and the arbitrary searches and excessive force they’ve faced from police.
Holden, who is black, dismissed these accounts in his interview with BuzzFeed, saying he would “pay for the polygraph test.”
“They’re not stopping and frisking people at random. Just do what is expected of you and you won’t be stopped and frisked,” he added.
State and city officials were criticized for meeting a Black Lives Matter protest over Sterling’s death last week with a fleet of armored trucks and police in riot gear who arrested dozens.
Gov. John Bel Edwards (D) said he was “very proud” of the response, which he deemed “very moderate.”
Baton Rouge Police Chief Carl Dabadie Jr. also defended the use of military gear at peaceful protests.
In a Monday press conference on the shooting of the three officers, Dabadie said the department’s tactics led to Long’s death and saved the lives of other cops.
“Our militarization tactics, as they are called, saved lives here,” Dabadie told BuzzFeed.
