Protesters urge officials to terminate Summerville officers involved in teen’s arrest
SUMMERVILLE, S.C. (WCSC) - Members of the community are calling for a change in the Summerville Police Department following the arrest of a 13-year-old boy earlier this week.
Lowcountry activists rallied together Saturday to urge Summerville Police Chief Doug Wright to terminate the officers who arrested the 13-year-old boy who was selling Palmetto Roses outside of Walmart on April 1.
Community advocate and North Charleston Pastor Thomas Dixon called for the peaceful march and rally, urging officials to terminate Officer Dante Ghi, one of the officers involved in the arrest.
Starting at Doty Park and ending near the Summerville Police Station, protesters carried signs with phrases like, “Ghi has got to go”, “Fire Dante Ghi”, and “You knowingly hired a bad cop! That makes you a bad cop too.”
One resident, Donimechia Singleton, said he had an interaction with Ghi when he was about 13 years old and said he believes the officer should have been terminated already.
“Right now, what we are saying and we’re demanding that he be fired so that he doesn’t have to traumatize our community any longer,” Singleton said. “I feel as if an officer comes into the community he should not come looking for or have a chip on his shoulder or vendetta. He should come and say these are human beings. Ghi has to go, he needs to get out, [and] the other officer needs to go, as well. Anybody who has been trained under Ghi needs to go.”
Summerville Mayor Russ Touchberry was at Saturday’s rally, and protesters shared their concerns with him.
“I don’t think our community, the Town of Summerville, or any community would be excited to have an incident like that occur in their town,” Touchberry said. “I’m committed to work[ing] with our council to address anything that we need to do.”
Many concerned protesters talked about Ghi’s time as an officer in other towns and said he has a history of violent run-ins.
“What bothers me more than anything about this is the fact that this officer has been canned from multiple agencies for his actions and it continues and why was he brought here? He has a truckload of problems and now those problems have been brought to our community,” Summerville resident and protester Bo Rupert said.
MORE: ‘We want accountability’: Family views Summerville bodycam footage of 13-year-old’s arrest
Patricia Cannon, another person at the rally, said she would like to see a law passed for officers who have been fired from other departments to not be hired elsewhere. She said Ghi was a liability to the Summerville Police Department.
“They can’t go on to be hired to beat somebody else up in some other department. It’s just crazy,” Cannon said.
Those at the rally said they were shocked to hear the officers expected the teen to have a business license and questioned their interaction with him from the beginning.
Rupert said he hoped Chief Wright and Mayor Touchberry would do the right thing and terminate the two officers that were involved in the arrest. He added that he hopes this is a lesson for the 13-year-old boy, but that on behalf of his community, he apologizes for what happened.
Cannon said that she knows Wright personally and that he is better than what is being displayed in his officers and she hopes that he will use whatever leverage he may have to let Ghi go.
“My heart sank. I mean, I started crying, I started shaking. I’m the mother of three sons. I couldn’t imagine that happening to my child, someone man-handling my child like that,” Cannon said regarding the video that circulated on social media. “I know emotionally, mentally, he’ll never forget that.”
She added that she can’t imagine what the family of the boy is going through, and says she wants them to know that the community stands with them.
“In my mind, especially as this last week, also Thursday marked the ninth year since Walter Scott was killed, was shot in his back by a North Charleston Police officer,” Dixon said. “My mind was telling me I hope this doesn’t escalate to the point where this cop shoots this kid. Which could’ve happened.”
Dixon questioned the officers who have trained under Ghi because he said he has been the department’s field training officer since he started at the Summerville Police Department more than five years ago.
“How many people has he trained in that type of tactic? The escalated tactic as opposed to deescalating the situations,” Dixon said.
What initiated the call for change in Summerville
Summerville Police say officers were patrolling the area of North Main Market Monday afternoon after receiving several complaints from business owners about individuals loitering and selling Palmetto Roses. The officers saw two people attempting to sell the roses near the entrance of Walmart when they used their PA system to ask them to move along.
The officers asked the people to leave the area because they didn’t have a business license to sell the flowers and one of the boys refused and began cursing at the officers, police said.
READ: Summerville Police release new details on juvenile arrest after video circulates
They said the officers attempted to detain the boy, and he began to resist and struck a female officer in the face with a closed fist, injuring her eye.
Police say the boy was eventually detained and released to his mother.
Summerville Police Department releases footage of arrest
In addition to the cellphone video of the arrest that has circulated on social media thousands of times, the Summerville Police Department has released footage from Walmart and both officers’ body cameras.
The videos have been edited to hide the boy’s identity and include on-screen text describing the reason police approached the boy and a second youth selling Palmetto Roses and what led to the arrest.
The videos were released by the department and also posted to the Summerville Police Department’s YouTube page.
It contains coarse language and some may find it very disturbing:
Summerville Police Chief Douglas Wright requested the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division conduct an independent examination of the evidence and circumstances.
Wright also asked The Dignity Project, a community organization that works to build collaboration between police and residents, to examine the footage and provide feedback from the community.
The boy’s family’s attorney calls for accountability
Attorney Marvin Pendarvis, a state senator who represents Charleston County, has said the released video has raised more questions than answers.
Pendarvis said during a news conference Wednesday morning that they planned to pursue civil and legal action after the family viewed the full bodycam footage of the arrest.
Pendarvis said the officers involved escalated the situation instead of de-escalating it, which he believes in a way was racially charged.
The boy, whose name has not been shared because of his age, is facing charges after he assaulted a Summerville Police officer during an incident at the Walmart on North Main Street in Summerville
Copyright 2024 WCSC. All rights reserved.
