Woman fired after calling police on black man in Central Park

NEW YORK — The encounter appears to have begun as one of those banal and brusque dustups between two New Yorkers. A black man, an avid birder, said he had asked a white woman to leash her dog in Central Park. She refused.

Then the encounter, which was recorded on video, took an ugly turn.

As the man, Christian Cooper, filmed on his phone, the woman, clutching her thrashing dog, calls the police, her voice rising in hysteria.

“I’m going to tell them there’s an African American man threatening my life,” she says to him while dialing, then repeats to the operator, “He’s African American.”

The video, posted to Twitter on Memorial Day, has been viewed nearly 30 million times, touching off intense discussions about the history of the police being falsely called on black people, sometimes putting their lives in danger.

Shortly after the video was posted by the man’s sister Monday, someone who said they had been the white woman’s dog walker identified her.

The woman’s name, Amy Cooper, soon began trending on Twitter.

By evening, Amy Cooper was placed on leave by her employer, the investment firm Franklin Templeton, while the incident was being investigated. Cooper headed insurance portfolio management at Franklin Templeton, according to her LinkedIn page, and graduated from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

On Tuesday afternoon, Franklin Templeton announced she had been fired.

Internet sleuths digging into Cooper’s life found an Instagram profile of her cocker spaniel mix and began sharing old photos documenting injuries the dog had suffered.

By nightfall Monday, she had surrendered the dog, Henry, to the group she had adopted him from two years prior, according to a Facebook post by the group, Abandoned Angels Cocker Spaniel Rescue.

Amy Cooper apologized, according to NBC, but denied being racist.

“I sincerely and humbly apologize to everyone, especially to that man, his family,” she said to the network. “It was unacceptable and I humbly and fully apologize to everyone who’s seen that video, everyone that’s been offended … everyone who thinks of me in a lower light and I understand why they do.”

Speaking to CNN, Christian Cooper said he would accept the apology “only if it is genuine and if she plans on keeping her dog on a leash going forward.”

Amy Cooper and Christian Cooper did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Police said they had responded to the report of an assault at about 8:10 p.m.

No summons was issued, and there was no arrest made.