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Editor’s note: This story contains details that some may find disturbing.

Three days after a video showing a Syracuse police officer physically restraining a young child and moving him into a police car started to circulate on social media, the Syracuse Police Department held a press conference to address the video.

Lt. Matthew Malinowski, SPD’s public information officer, stated during the conference that the incident is still under the department’s review. SPD is reviewing all available camera footage and speaking with all officers involved, he said.

“This is not an overnight process. But we acknowledge that this incident has started a viral social media video that has been of great interest of people in our community and from across the nation,” Malinowski said.

A Tuesday statement issued by SPD on Twitter acknowledged the video circulated on social media. The statement said that there were multiple “juveniles accused of stealing from a store on the City’s northside.” The child in the police car was brought home following the incident. The officers met with his father and no charges were filed, the release said.

Mayor Ben Walsh released a statement on the incident on Tuesday night which said that he had seen body camera footage and handcuffs were not used on the child. Walsh also said the officer “knew the child from prior interactions and explained to him that he was being taken home.”

On Wednesday, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul spoke on the video. “As a mother, that was a heart-wrenching video to witness,” Hochul said. She added that she spoke with Walsh about the importance of building trust between the Syracuse community and its police.

My statement on the video of the recent incident involving @SyracusePolice. pic.twitter.com/2JyqKvvnVC

— Ben Walsh (@BenWalsh44) April 19, 2022

At the conference, Sgt. Mark Rusin of SPD presented portions of the video footage taken by the body camera worn by the officers — David Ciciriello, Matthew Behuniak and Jacob Kittelberger.

The officers responded to a larceny complaint at around 12:15 p.m. on Sunday, Rusin said. The store clerk told the officers that multiple juveniles — with whom both the officers and the store clerk were familiar — had stolen multiple bags of Doritos chips and left the store.

Rusin also said the officers left the store and located the group of juveniles approximately one block away. In the first video taken by one of the officer’s body-worn camera, two other officers were filmed while encountering the group of children.

“Where are you going? Didn’t we just go through this?” Officer Behuniak said to one of the children after pouring a bag of chips to the ground, as shown in the first clip of the videos. Behuniak then started to drag the child toward one of the police vehicles while the child resisted and started to scream and cry.

The second clip of the video presented at the conference, taken by Behuniak’s body-worn camera, shows the child crying in the police vehicle with his right hand holding the railing of the car window. No handcuffs were put on the child’s hands in the video.

Behuniak repeatedly said “stop” while the child cried and struggled in the car. The officer then closed the door and argued with several witnesses standing on the curbside about the decision to restrain and move the child into the car before he drove and left.

The third clip, also taken by Behuniak’s body-worn camera, was filmed inside the police car while Behuniak was driving. The boy continued to scream and cry in the backseat while struggling in the car.

“Nope, you are going home,” Behuniak said to the boy at one point in the clip.

“It wasn’t even me,” the boy screamed later on.

The fourth clip, taken by one of the officer’s body-worn cameras, filmed the three officers’ interaction with the boy’s father. “That’s what they (the group of children involved) do every day — they go to stores and they steal stuff,” one of the officers told the father.

The fifth clip, which is about 10 minutes in length, showed the officers talking to both the 8-year-old’s father, identified by syracuse.com as Anthony Weah, and the children before leaving the scene.

After the presentation of the body-worn camera footage, First Deputy Chief Joe Cecile of SPD walked to the podium. He acknowledged parts of the videos are “hard to watch,” referencing when the boy was screaming and crying in the backseat of the police car.

“It’s visceral. It’s visceral to all of us. You wouldn’t be a human being if you didn’t feel for that,” Cecile said. “But I want to say that the video that was pushed out by the citizen, (the one that) went viral, was only part of the story.”

Cecile said the released body-worn camera video demonstrated a more well-rounded story with a positive outcome that some might call “uplifting,” referring to the final section of the footage where the father and children are interacting with the officers outside their home.

However, Cecile said that while SPD can learn from the low points of the interaction and what went wrong, he said that some things went right, such as the child not being handcuffed and arrested, the officers having familiarity with the child and taking the time to speak with the family, and that should not be overlooked.

“This is community policing 101,” Cecile said. “It’s what every citizen is asking from their police department — community policing. And it’s what we ask the officers to do as well.”

The father of the child told syracuse.com that he wants to file a complaint regarding the incident.

Cecile pointed to “chronic complaints” of inaction by local authorities and government regarding frequent theft and criminal mischief committed by young people in the Northside neighborhood.

He then discussed how a district captain at the SPD visited the home of this child less than a month ago, giving the children police badge stickers and having a conversation with them and their father about school, after school activities and their other interests. Cecile also said that the children in the incident have participated in events hosted by the police athletic league, where they played sports alongside members of the SPD and even the mayor.

“We’re trying our best, folks, and the officers are trying their best too,” he said. “We would prefer to not be put in these positions at all. We’d prefer to interact with these kids at PAL or on a pick-up basketball game on the street, but we rarely have that luxury.”

He then said that bringing the child home and having a conversation with the parents would be “what any parent would want (police officers) to do.”

“Overall it was a good ending,” Cecile said. “At this point, we need to move beyond vilifying the officers.”

During a Q&A session at the end of the press conference, Cecile confirmed that while there is an ongoing investigation into the incident, the officers are still on duty.

Walsh took the podium after Cecile and said the incident has “struck a nerve” in the city and across the country.

“We’ve all been angry. We’ve felt sadness — how could you not, listening to that little boy screaming and crying? But above all else, I think everyone is frustrated,” Walsh said. “The community is frustrated that they’re seeing another viral video of a young Black child having a negative interaction with law enforcement.”

He added that police officers are frustrated by having to “deal with these kids that need so much help,” at the call of the mayor and common councilors.

Walsh then said that the father of the children also appeared to sound frustrated in the video.

“Everyone’s feelings are legitimate here. Everybody. But we need to resist blaming,” Walsh said. “We need to focus on learning from this because we’re all frustrated.”

However, Walsh then agreed with Cecile’s assessment of the positive outcome of the incident. He said that if there was no video and someone had simply presented him with the events that occurred, he would say “good job.”

He then said that while he would have liked to see things go better with the “tough” earlier videos, the last video was “gold.”

Walsh then pointed to progress made in efforts by the city to improve diversionary and alternative response strategies, including an agreement approved by the Common Council on April 11 with Liberty Resources to provide alternative response options for officers.

He said the city needs to do better with creating these options for dealing with children, noting that officers would be happy to defer to experts and that he knows the difficulties of dealing with 8-year-olds as the parent of one himself.

“This is a painful situation for everybody involved,” Walsh said. “I know we can do better, and I believe we will do better.”

Published on April 21, 2022 at 11:11 pm

Contact Francis: [email protected] | @francis_towne