HARASSMENT, SPITTING AND ASSAULT: INSIDE
THE UGLY BEDLAM AT BAYSIDE PROTESTS
3
QUEENS WEEKLY, JULY 19, 2020
BY ANGÉLICA ACEVEDO
When a pro-police rally and
a Black Lives Matter demonstration
faced off in Crocheron Park
in Bayside on Sunday, July 12,
several incidents of harassment
and one assault took center stage.
Only one individual, who claims
he wasn’t responsible for any of
those incidents, was arrested as a
result of the bedlam.
The two separate demonstrations
in Bayside took place on
Sunday, with the Black Lives Matter
(BLM) demonstration kicking
off first around noon. That demonstration
began at Crocheron
Park and marched to Bell Boulevard.
But Jessica, one of the organizers
with Bayside’s BLM group
who asked for her last name not to
be used, said that they decided to
head back to the park after about
five protesters with Warriors in
the Garden — a collective of activists
dedicated to non-violent
protest — told her they were encountering
some pushback from
pro-police demonstrators on Bell
Boulevard.
The Warriors originally decided
to leave the BLM march to Bell
due to a “heavy police escort,”
which they said they’ve had bad
experiences with in the past.
But back at the park, the two
sets of demonstrators started to
engage in discussions that quickly
escalated to verbal attacks. While
the BLM protesters started reading
out some police facts and telling
the pro-police demonstrators
why they should join them, with a
fence in between the two groups,
some individuals with the pro-police
group on the other side began
yelling and spitting at them.
This led the BLM protesters
to come around the fence to tell
police officers about what some
members of the pro-police group
were doing and see if they could
file complaints.
Things quickly escalated from
there.
As the two groups got closer,
verbal attacks turned physical.
Police tried to create a barrier between
the hundreds of pro-police
demonstrators and the few dozen
BLM demonstrators.
But according to some BLM
demonstrators, someone from
the pro-police group managed to
avoid the barrier.
An unidentified white man
wearing a gray T-shirt with the
words “NYPD” and no mask was
seen slapping a woman marching
with Bayside’s Black Lives Matter
group.
Kristen McManus, a 37-yearold
Bayside resident, told QNS she
is the woman who was slapped.
She told QNS the man came up
from behind the Black Lives Matter
group and started harassing
and spitting at some of the protesters.
While they were trying
to protect other Black and Brown
members, he reached out and hit
her across the face.
“After he did that, the crowd
took after him, and he went running,”
McManus said. “I tried telling
the cops, but they didn’t stop
him. I had cops surrounding me,
but nobody asked if I needed medical
attention or if I wanted to file a
report. It was like being in a riot,
almost.”
She said this happened at about
2:30 p.m.
“I only know because of my Fitbit,
I had about 148 heartbeats per
minute at that time,” McManus
said. “It didn’t go down by much
that whole day.”
The unidentified man was not
arrested on the scene.
When McManus reported the
incident the following day at the
111th Precinct, police told her she
should’ve called 911 as soon as it
happened.
“If you were hit and there’s a
wall of police, and you’re saying
that the man is right there and
nobody turns to see … That’s the
problem. That’s why we protest,”
she said. “My hair is neon pink;
I’m standing out in a crowd. You
can see I’m asking for help and
they’re acting like I’m invisible. If
they’re gonna do that to me, how
can we expect them to take care of
anyone else?”
Jessica said when some protesters
tried to get his motorcycle’s
license plate, the police told
them to stay back.
When asked if any arrests
have been made in connection to
McManus’ assault and if the man
had been identified as of Tuesday,
an NYPD spokesperson said there
are no updates as of yet.
McManus said that when she
filed a report the following day,
police told her it doesn’t qualify
as an assault because she didn’t
make the call at the scene. But
when McManus asked a representative
from the Legal Aid Society,
they told her that is incorrect
and it is up to the district attorney’s
office to make that call.
It is still unclear, then, how
and why Yacine Diallo, a 21-yearold
protester with Warriors in the
Garden, was arrested a few minutes
after McManus’ incident at
Crocheron Park’s parking lot.
A video of the moment it occurred
shows several police officers
grabbing and beating him
while he was on the ground before
he was arrested, followed by
cheers from the pro-police demonstrators.
Diallo, a Black man, told QNS
he didn’t even see it coming.
Diallo said he was at the front
of their group, making sure there
was a “good barrier” between
them, the police and pro-police
demonstrators, when he heard a
scream.
“When I went to see what happened,
I saw a police officer come
at me, then five came at me, and
I didn’t know what happened,”
Diallo said. “While I was on the
ground they kept punching me.”
Diallo, a Bronx resident, was
arrested and taken to the 111th
Precinct at about 2:36 p.m. He said
police officers did not tell him why
he was detained and refused to
give him medical attention when
he asked.
“They said, ‘You are detained
so you can’t ask,’” said Diallo, who
was never arrested or in a police
car before Sunday. “A police officer
told me I was going there for
my own security. I’m like, ‘How
are you putting me in jail for my
own security?'”
He was released at about 7
p.m. Fellow Warriors in the Garden
members waited for him and
called a Legal Aid Society representative
to help.
According to an NYPD spokesperson,
Diallo was arrested for
“attempting to hit an unidentified
victim with a closed fist.” The
spokesperson said he’s charged
with inciting a riot, attempted assault,
and disorderly conduct and
harassment. He was also given a
desk appearance ticket.
Diallo said he was only told
about one charge: inciting a riot.
“I have to go to court, so I’m
working with my lawyer,” said Diallo,
adding that he’s been resting
and figuring out what to do now.
“What they did to me, they will do
to another person.”
Steve Behar, a lifelong resident
of Bayside who was marching
with the Black Lives Matter protesters
and was at the scene of the
arrest, claimed the cops targeted
Diallo. He also said he told one of
the officers the unidentified white
man on a motorcycle was causing
the trouble, but they told him they
“didn’t see it happen.”
“His name was Officer Morales,
and his response was, ‘I
didn’t see anything’ — as if they
need to see something to investigate,”
Behar said.
Behar and Jessica added that a
few moments after Diallo’s arrest,
a police officer pepper sprayed
two other Black women with the
Black Lives Matter group. Video
of that moment is not available.
In the moments leading up to
the incidents in the park’s parking
lot, Behar described a tense
encounter between the hundreds
of Blue Lives Matter and the few
dozen Black Lives Matter demonstrators.
“They started screaming racial
slurs, telling Asians and Hispanics
to ‘go back to their country,'”
Behar said.
Jessica, with Bayside’s BLM
group, said she witnessed some
questionable behavior from the
police officers working the protests
that day. One instance was
when she told their police escort
they were turning back to the
park, which she claimed was met
with frustration from the officers
in charge.
“One officer said to me, ‘What,
you lost control of the crowd?’
And we said ‘No, you lost control
of us.’ Some of the cops were
mad and I heard one say, ‘I wish
I could punch them in the face,'”
she said.
After the incidents took place
and the pro-police march was
about to begin, Diallo and Jessica
both claimed they heard one of
the commanding officers tell police
officers to turn on their body
cameras.
Read more on QNS.com.
Yacine Diallo, a protester with the Black Lives Matter movement, was the only person arrested at Bayside
protests on July 12. Photo by Dean Moses
/QNS.com
