Tension with students mitigated, police officer returns to Albany High School
School Resource Officer David Belman returns to Albany High School Tuesday, after being absent from the school for the past month, during which a whirlwind of student protest surged on the campus calling for his resignation.
The complaint was sparked by the arrest of a senior at the school, Omari Parker, on a street near the campus during lunchtime at the beginning of October.
Parker was sitting in a car parked on the street, with a door open to the traffic, when Belman approached him to ask for his driver license, according to a report by the Albany Police Department.
Parker said he didn’t have a license and the car was not his, and then attempted to walk away. Belman grabbed his right arm to prevent him from leaving. Parker resisted.
“I ordered him to stop resisting and to place his hands behind his back. He continued to resist and pull away from me, ” said Belman in the police report.
The confrontation continued until another police officer came and helped to handcuff Parker, who was then put into a police car and taken to the police department.
Several of Parker’s friends were standing nearby on a sidewalk watching the incident, and perceived it very differently from the police.
One of them was senior Romit Joshr, who owns the car Parker sat in. Joshr said that Belman had always been stern towards his friends and him. He believed that Belman knew the car was not Parker’s, and therefore he was purposely finding fault with Parker by asking for license.
“He treats us like criminals. He doesn’t treat us like students, ” Joshr said.
Joshr said that Belman had given him a couple of outrageous tickets, one of which was for pedestrian on roadway.
Belman said that a group of students always stood on the road obstructing traffic, and he issued the ticket after the students had ignored his warning for numerous times.
“I’d rather give them warnings, but after certain amount of time, if you warn them enough, they are not getting the message, you have to give them tickets, because it’s for their safety, and for everybody else’s safety, ” Belman said.
The conflict escalated with Parker’s arrest. The students believed that the arrest was unjust, and told parents and teachers about it.
David DeHart, a social studies teacher at the school, supported the students.
“There was no criminal activity going on that warranted an arrest, ” said DeHart. “He (Parker) was being arrested for resisting arrest, but he had never been told in the first place why he was arrested.”
The issue gets more complicated when Parker, an African American, believes that the police discriminated against him due to his skin color.
“I’d only heard about racial-profiling on TV before. This is the first time I’ve experienced it myself, ” said 17-year-old Parker.
Belman said that the arrest had nothing to do with race.
“It doesn’t matter what color you are, if you are standing in the roadway and you can be hit by a car, you are going to get contacted, ” he said.
However, a considerable number of students think that Parker’s rights were violated. Under the guidance of DeHart, they organized a rally and wrote a petition addressed to the Superintendent and Albany Police Chief.
“We, the undersigned, demand the resignation of officer David Belman at Albany High School, as well as the termination of Albany police harassment and racial profiling, ” the petition said.
About 530 students have signed the petition before it was handed in to principal Ted Barone last Friday.
Barone declined to comment directly on the arrest. He said his role is to facilitate communication between the students and the police.
He talked with Albany Police Chief Mike McQuiston shortly after the arrest and asked him to investigate the incident. McQuiston was responsive and went to attend several meetings at the school to listen to students’ complaints.
“We’ve been listening to them, and we are working hard to address their concerns,” McQuiston said.
The police and school administrators met several times recently to discuss the issue. Marla Stephenson, Superintendent of Albany Unified School District, said that Parker shouldn’t have walked away from Belman when he was being questioned. The school district will give more lessons to teach students how to interact with police properly, and will invite McQuiston and Belman to be guest speakers.
“We have to do a lot of training on where school authority ends and where policing begins, “ Stephenson said.
She said the school district and the police are also working on setting up clear guidelines for Belman’s role as a School Resource Officer (SRO).
Unlike other police officers, the SRO is funded partly by the school district and responsible for campus safety. Many students and teachers expect the officer to treat students as educators do, and to solve problems within the campus instead of taking students who committed minor offense to the police department.
“We don’t expect a police officer to be the kids’ friends, but to respect them, to treat them with kindness, and to treat them as an educator when that’s appropriate is what we want, ” said Barone.
The guidelines defining the SRO’s duties will be written down and announced to the school community in a week or so, according to Barone.
Ted Barone, Principal of Albany High School
Belman said that he sees himself primarily as a policeman whose job is enforcing the law, but he is willing to talk to students and show them that he is “not a mean cop”.
He will meet with a small group of student representatives Wednesday. A SRO Student Committee is going to be set up under Belman’s proposal, so the officer and the students could meet regularly to discuss issues of concerns.
“I think it’s fair to give him a second chance, ” said Kyle Kubler, a student who organized the petition. “We have to trust the administration that the same problem is not going to happen again. “
Officer David Belman and Principal Ted Barone on Albany High School campus. Photos by Linda (Linjun) Fan.
Hi.. I witnessed the incident with Officer Belman and Omari. Officer Belman’s statement insinuating that Omari resisted arrest is false.
Officer Bellman’s statement indicates that there was physical resistance and that he needed an additional officer to “handle the situation”. NONSENSE… Maybe Bellman did not know how to put on the handcuffs … but there was no physical resistance on Omari’s part.
Officer Belman took Omari and placed him against the car when Omari was still in the process of getting out of the car. There was absolutely no indication of physical resistance on Omari’s part.
What I did note of one of the many officers that were on the scene, is that one came to the police car “after” Omari was already handcuffed and sitting in the back seat, and reached in and yanked Omari’s hat off of his head and threw it on the ground.
I was shocked at this behavior, which in my opinion, was absolutely unnecessary and could only be perceived as a form of intimidation and/or harassment.
I have already written a letter stating my observation. which was hopefully passed on to the Superintendent of AUSD.
It is my opinion that if Offficer Bellaman’s intention is to calm the waters of his strained relationship with students, and some staff… he should start by telling the truth.
Ms. Shibano
Ms. Shibano-I’m so glad a teacher witnessed this and is willing to speak out. Bellman has been harassing the students of Albany High ever since he was hired, but this time he crossed the line and he got caught. I’m curious to see what will happen in the future, if the school and police department will stay true to their words. Imani, Belman…what goon are they going to hire next to keep the school “safe?”
As a student of Albany High and as a student who signed the petition to remove Mr. Belman from being our SRO (Student Resource Officer) I am somewhat outraged at the outcome of these events. According to the article 530 students signed the petition to remove Officer Belman from campus and instead a request from nearly half the school’s student alumni including a few teachers has been ignored. “Mitigated” is hardly a word that should be used considering students are still riled and infuriated about Omari’s arrest.
While this incident has sparked movement amongst the students of Albany High I am angered to see Mr. Belman still around campus when the option of removing him and replacing him with another officer has been ignored.
He’s slowly easing himself back into the Albany High community. While he may have individual meetings amongst small groups of students to discuss what had happened and how he can improve as our SRO I feel that this is a case of racial profiling and it really just goes to show what the Albany Police Department does in its spare time.
I might want to add but there is a supposed rumor that the Albany police obtained a warrant to search Omari’s home for “a stolen ipod”. This claim comes around the same time as Omari’s arrest.
feel free to e-mail me at “micahaha@gmail.com “
This may be late, and i don’t know where officer Belman is now. My family and Ihave known him for a long time. I just needed to set the record straight. He has been a decent human being, he is probrably just trying to do his job and trying his best to protect others. As for racial profiling that makes me laugh, he is not a racist. I know this for a fact, I grew up with him in high school in san francisco. How diverse can you get. Many students may say that he was racial profiling but i disagree. I am glad the school district was on davids side. This is ridiculous. Hope all is well david and your family. naomi