Officer Searches Cyclist's Bag Without Probable Cause or Consent

Last week, the Silver Lake Neighborhood Council became the second Neighborhood Council to endorse the Cyclists' Bill of Rights, written by the Bike Writer's Collective.  For the second time, cyclists on their way home from a Bill of Rights presentation were detained by police for no apparent reason proving the need for such a document.  Ironically, clause three of the Bill or Rights states:

 right #3, “Cyclists have the right to the full support of educated law enforcement”

This time, the infraction that led to the confrontation was a cyclist asking the police why another cyclist was being detained.  This led to an illegal search and a half hour hand-cuffing while the police tried to figure out what else they could pin on the questioner.  Eventually he "got off" for not having a front light on his bike, even though he approached the police on foot not on his bicycle.

Alex Thompson was on the scene.  He reports:

So we flipped a U-turn and returned to the scene, Paul and Andrea arriving before me as I got hung up across the street at a red light. Paul rolled up onto the sidewalk, dismounted, and asked what was going on. The cyclist indicated everything was ok, and by the time I arrived Paul was asking the police why they had stopped the cyclist. Officer Corona told Paul with hostility that it was none of his business. Paul explained is his calm, unwavering style that we were here to observe, and that the situation seemed strange considering we had just seen this cyclist riding safely and legally without incident.

Corona blew a fuse and he told Paul not to move, and said we would be going to jail for interfering. He gave Paul no prior instruction to step back. It was only when Corona began searching Paul that I realized this was really happening. So I pulled out my Nikon and held down the shutter as I dialed Enci Box when he didn’t pick up. Around the same time Officer Stine and Corona instructed me to back up or I would also be jailed. Stephen Box got on the phone with the Watch Commander and urged him to send a supervisor to the scene, as I also requested one from Officer Stine.

The officers both changed their demeanor under the scrutiny of the camera. Still, when I told Corona that this was a retaliatory arrest for our observing them he confirmed it - in fact he seemed proud of it. Corona berated Paul, asking him repeatedly “can I look in you bag? What’s in the bag? I’m going to look in your bag” and so on, while Paul reiterated that he did not consent to a search. Eventually Corona opened up the bag anyway, finding . . . a whole lot of nothing.

Eventually a supervising officer, Sergeant Harrington arrived on the scene. He questioned his officers about the stop, then Paul, and finally myself and Andrea. I suggested that this was unwarranted and that we had a right to observe the stop, and Harrington insisted that we did not have a right to observe police action. The law says I’m right, but Harrington insisted repeatedly that I was not.

The incident doesn't end there as the eventually released cyclists head over to the police station to ask about their illegal treatment and are basically ignored.  Stephen Box was there for that part of the discussion and picks up the story.

I head over to the Station and get Lt. Donatoni to the front desk. Paul arrives and brings his bike to the counter with a headlight blazing and asks for the "correctable" ticket to be corrected. Donatoni says they don't do that. We ask who does. He doesn't know.

We ask to file complaints. We argue about the rights of a "detainee" to observers. We argue about the circumstances of the incident that evening. We point out that his instructions to ask for a Supervisor are rejected by his own Officers.

We ask if they also handcuff, detain, search and go through the personal property of other stopped for infractions such as talking on a cell phone or driving a car with expired tags or a burned out tail light. Crickets chirp.

We ask again to file a complaint and we're told to sit down and wait. The clock ticks. Officer Russell #1 and Officer Russell #2 sit at the front counter working on computers. From the clicking sounds, I can only imagine how cool their MySpace pages must be!

It's now way late. We talk about the frequency of the incidents in which cyclists encounter the Police and end up in an adversarial relationship simply for thinking that the streets are ours to ride as equals and that the Police are there to support our rights and our safety. 

Photo: Alex Thompson/Flickr