Concerns raised over cyclist's violent arrest
A bicyclist's alleged traffic violation near Bay Street and West Cliff Drive reportedly led to a strong physical use of force from several Santa Cruz police officers Wednesday.
The interaction, initially a Santa Cruz police motorcycle traffic officer stopping a cyclist around 10:50 a.m. on Bay Street, drew the attention of residents of the nearby Clearview Court mobile home park, two neighbors told the Sentinel.
Residents Marlene Sosa and Phyllis Galvan on Thursday separately described being left deeply disturbed by the interaction. Sosa said that as events unfolded, police backup — some eight officers in total — arrived on the scene, right outside the park's gated driveway.
“At the blink of an eye. The young man was on his bike and within a second, they had him on the ground and they were trying to flip him to his stomach,” Sosa said of officers. “He's yelling, `What did I do? What did I do? Why are you hurting me?' And it took them a good five minutes on the ground, wrestling with him.”
Sosa and Galvan both said they saw one officer raise their baton in the air, though neither saw the officer striking the cyclist. Sosa likened the officers' response to that of the 2020 death of George Floyd, after an officer from the Minneapolis Police Department knelt on Floyd's neck for nine minutes while he lay handcuffed on the ground. No Santa Cruz officers are alleged to have knelt on the cyclist's neck, but Sosa said she felt the initial stop and subsequent response were racially motivated, unnecessary and “such an obvious `riding a bike while Black.'”
“I was out there and I and everyone else started screaming, `Stop it. Stop it. Stop it,' ” Sosa said of the crowd's reaction when the officer's baton was raised.
Santa Cruz Police Deputy Chief Jon Bush, reached Thursday for comment, said the cyclist was stopped after allegedly neglecting to yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk, a misdemeanor.
He said the cyclist, identified as Teran Whitley, 29, of Santa Cruz, was arrested on suspicion of providing a false name to officers, possessing more than an ounce of marijuana and resisting arrest after being “very adamant that he wasn't going to comply” with numerous commands to follow orders. Asked about the number of officers, including a supervisor, who responded to the call, Bush said that “pretty much any and all available officers respond” when their colleagues make similar requests for backup.
The Sentinel was unable to reach Whitley for comment before its print deadline.
“We did get a complaint from a concerned citizen, so we will take a look at it, make sure if there was any policy or law violations, we'll investigate the matter,” Bush said, adding that the interaction was caught on officers' body-worn cameras and details of the incident would be forwarded to Santa Cruz's independent police auditor for review.
Galvan, another witness to Wednesday's traffic stop, said she had filed the police complaint after witnessing the latter portion of the interaction, when a crowd of officers was already pinning Whitley to the ground and beating him, she said.
“I saw only the extreme brutality, so many officers on top of this man hitting, cuffing, shackling, threatening to taser him and at least one officer using a baton,” Galvan wrote in an email to the Sentinel.
In a subsequent interview, Galvan said she spent the day worrying about the young man's health.
“I can't think of any reason why anybody should be treated that way, no matter what they think that they've done,” Galvan said. “It was sad.”
Bush said that Whitley was not injured during the confrontation with police.
Whitley's local court records show a history of interactions with law enforcement dating back to 2010, primarily via the California Highway Patrol and Santa Cruz Police Department and largely related to traffic violations ranging from lack of license and registration to intoxication and illegal substances.