"Detroit artist arrested while working on city-commissioned mural"

[btfc]

' A Detroit artist wants an apology from police after he was arrested after being suspected of vandalism while he was working on a mural the city commissioned him to complete.

Tashif Turner, a.k.a. Sheefy McFly, was commissioned by the city as part of City Walls, a multi-year effort to fight illegal graffiti with city-approved artwork.


"They treated me more so like a criminal than an artist," he told As It Happens guest host Susan Bonner.

Turner said officers from the local precinct asked him about his work earlier in the week. He showed them his city-issued permit, which they accepted.

Days later when he was nearing the end of his work on the mural, two officers from a different precinct approached him, asking what he was doing. He wasn't holding his permit at the time. '

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/det...-1.5188086

[$tevie]

Improved signage and lanyards should help the situation. Not sure what can be done about the racist cops, but if they figure it out they need to share it widely.

[sekker]

yep, need to keep your papers on you at all times.

Too bad, this is a perfect example of max's favorite line.

[rjmacs]

This is only in the realm of our awareness because the story has some built-in irony that makes it appealing. That makes me stop and reflect on the persistence with which Black people, just doing their jobs as I would do, but without the benefit of my skin tone or an ironic twist in their story, experience the skepticism, humiliation, frustration, anger, and loss of time, money, and drive that comes with being interrogated by cops like this.

It's a helpful, if not pleasant, thing to sit and think about.