Investigators in North Carolina’s Duplin County are now examining possible wrongdoing after shocking video showing an altercation between a young man and a police officer started going viral.
The video shows 22-year-old Anthony Wall being choke-slammed to the ground by a Warsaw, NC deputy outside a Waffle House on Saturday, May 5th.
According to Warsaw police, deputies were called to the scene after Wall reportedly entered into an argument with a restaurant employee.
Here’s the original footage of the video, which has already received over 1.1 million views and over 43,000 shares on Anthony Wall’s Facebook page;
Wall commented that he was taking his 16-year-old sister to her Union High School’s prom. He said that when the officer approached him, his hands were up and he wasn’t resisting arrest. He said that he felt that there was no need for the officer to choke him or slam him to the ground.
AJ Connors, The Mayor of the Town of Warsaw, just released the following video, in which he essentially dismisses any wrongdoing by the police officer;
The NAACP released this statement on the incident:
On May 8th, a viral video began circulating of a violent police takedown outside of a North Carolina Waffle House. The footage shows Anthony Wall, an unarmed Black man who had just taken his younger sister to prom, get choked and forcefully thrown to the ground by a white Warsaw, North Carolina, police officer. This incident comes just weeks after the overly aggressive arrest of another unarmed Black Waffle House customer, Chikesia Clemons. Sherrilyn Ifill, President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF), issued the following statement:
We’re once again outraged by a video showing police officers using excessive force on an unarmed, non-violent African-American Waffle House customer. Once again this incident was sparked when a Waffle House employee called the police after the patron allegedly complained about customer service. And once again the police responded with violence. Last month, in Saraland, Alabama, a customer’s mere questioning of why she was being charged extra for plastic utensils – when she never had before – appeared to spiral out of control after employees called the police. The dehumanizing arrest of Chikesia Clemons alarmed neither the Saraland Police Department nor Waffle House, who have both failed to accept any responsibility for potential wrongdoing and hold those at fault responsible.
After a reported small disagreement at a Waffle House in Warsaw, North Carolina, it appears that employees unreasonably heightened the situation by calling local law enforcement. Twenty-two-year-old Anthony Wall, who had just taken his sixteen-year-old sister to prom, was then choked and violently thrown on the ground by Warsaw Police Officer Frank Moss. The officer’s actions were grossly inappropriate, and we call on the Warsaw Police Department and District Attorney to conduct a thorough and transparent investigation of the officer’s conduct by publicly releasing any body-worn and/or surveillance camera footage, as well as audio of the call for police service. The officer should also be placed on administrative duty during the investigation.
In both cases, the Black customers were reportedly unarmed and non-violent. Neither situation warranted police intervention, let alone such gratuitous use-of-force. Waffle House must conduct an extensive review and overhaul of its policies to ensure that employees do not needlessly subject customers of color to police contact and brutality. Police officials are not a private security force for untrained Waffle House employees. Waffle House cannot continue to avoid this issue.
What are your thoughts on the incident?