Woman loses her job after calling police on African American man

NEW YORK >> The encounter appears to have begun as one of those banal and brusque dust-ups 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 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, twice, “African American.”

The video, posted to Twitter on Memorial Day, has been viewed more than 30 million times.

Within 24 hours, the woman, identified as Amy Cooper (no relation to Christian Cooper), had given up her dog, publicly apologized and been fired from her job.

The incident took place about 8:10 a.m. Monday in the Ramble, the semi-wild section of Central Park.

After Amy Cooper refused to restrain the dog, Christian Cooper said he planned to offer the dog treats to lure it away and induce her to leash the animal, according to a Facebook post.

The video captures Amy Cooper first asking Christian Cooper to stop filming her, then saying she will call the police and claim that she is being threatened by “an African American.”

“Please tell them whatever you like,” Christian Cooper says off camera.

She proceeds to call. “I’m in the Ramble, there is a man, African American, he has a bicycle helmet and he is recording me and threatening me and my dog,” she says to the 911 operator.

By nightfall, Amy Cooper had surrendered Henry to the cocker spaniel rescue group she had adopted him from two years prior and also publicly apologized, but denied being racist.

“I sincerely and humbly apologize to everyone, especially to that man, his family,” she told WNBC. “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.”