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The 61-year-old was allegedly handcuffed at gunpoint when police thought he was attempting to burglarize the home.
Watch: Black man handcuffed while moving into his own home
March 21, 201903:10
March 21, 2019, 3:24 PM PDT
By Farnoush Amiri
The ACLU is asking a police department in Kansas to investigate allegations that a black man was arrested while moving into his new home.
Karle Robinson, 61, a former Marine, was allegedly moving a television into his home in Tonganoxie on Aug. 19 when police stopped and detained him at gunpoint for suspected burglary, according to the ACLU of Kansas in a letter to state Attorney General Derek Schmidt.
The civil rights organization calls the episode a case of "moving while black."
The office of the Attorney General said it has received and reviewed the letter and forwarded it to the Kansas Commission on Peace Officers Standards and Training, per state law.
In a statement to NBC News on Thursday, Tonganoxie Police Chief Greg Lawson said the ACLU letter "contains multiple accusations that are inaccurate," but that if there were to be an investigation the department intends to "fully cooperate."
Watch: Black man handcuffed while moving into his own home
March 21, 201903:10
March 21, 2019, 3:24 PM PDT
By Farnoush Amiri
The ACLU is asking a police department in Kansas to investigate allegations that a black man was arrested while moving into his new home.
Karle Robinson, 61, a former Marine, was allegedly moving a television into his home in Tonganoxie on Aug. 19 when police stopped and detained him at gunpoint for suspected burglary, according to the ACLU of Kansas in a letter to state Attorney General Derek Schmidt.
The civil rights organization calls the episode a case of "moving while black."
The office of the Attorney General said it has received and reviewed the letter and forwarded it to the Kansas Commission on Peace Officers Standards and Training, per state law.
In a statement to NBC News on Thursday, Tonganoxie Police Chief Greg Lawson said the ACLU letter "contains multiple accusations that are inaccurate," but that if there were to be an investigation the department intends to "fully cooperate."
ACLU seeks investigation of arrest of black man moving into new home
Also from the article
Robinson, who recently moved from Merriam to Tonganoxie, told the ACLU that police routinely followed him and repeatedly harassed him and that it only stopped when he went to the press.
ACLU said that many of the facts police pointed to as the basis for suspicion "are disproved by the body cam footage and are inconsistent with other independently verified facts," the letter said.
"Each of these incidents would be concerning had they been alleged independently," the letter reads. "Together, they suggest a pervasive culture of racial bias and systematic process failure within the Tonganoxie Police Department."
ACLU said that many of the facts police pointed to as the basis for suspicion "are disproved by the body cam footage and are inconsistent with other independently verified facts," the letter said.
"Each of these incidents would be concerning had they been alleged independently," the letter reads. "Together, they suggest a pervasive culture of racial bias and systematic process failure within the Tonganoxie Police Department."