NewsVine_Mariyam
Platinum Member
This isn't even a slap on the wrist but it's a start since it's alleged that she is the first white person to be charged with maliciously making a false report on a black person, after all these centuries of malice.
"Ms. Cooper was captured on video calling the police after Christian Cooper asked her to keep her dog on a leash in Central Park.
Amy Cooper was captured on video reporting Christian Cooper to the police.
Credit...Christian Cooper
By Jan Ransom
When Amy Cooper, a white woman, called 911 from an isolated patch in Central Park where she was standing with her unleashed dog on Memorial Day, she said an “African-American man” was threatening her life, emphasizing his race to the operator.
Moments before Ms. Cooper made the call, the man, Christian Cooper, an avid bird-watcher, had asked her to leash her dog, and she had refused.
On Monday, Ms. Cooper was charged with filing a false report, a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail, the latest fallout from an encounter that resonated across the country and provoked intense discussions about how Black people are harmed when sham reports to the police are made about them by white people.
Video of the encounter that Mr. Cooper shot on his phone has been viewed more than 40 million times. It was widely perceived as a startling and sobering example of racial attitudes in New York City, which prides itself on its supposedly progressive ideals.
The video was posted to Twitter by Mr. Cooper’s sister.
The footage shows Amy Cooper calling the police on Christian Cooper in Central Park after he asked her to keep her dog on a leash. The video was posted to Twitter by Mr. Cooper’s sister.
The pending criminal charge against Ms. Cooper appears to be among the first that a white person in the United States has faced for wrongfully calling the police to make a complaint about a Black person.
“We are strongly committed to holding perpetrators of this conduct accountable,” said Cyrus R. Vance Jr., the Manhattan district attorney.
Ms. Cooper, who was issued a desk appearance ticket on Monday, is scheduled to be arraigned on Oct. 14. If convicted, she could receive a conditional discharge or be sentenced to community service or counseling rather than jail time.
Ms. Cooper could not be reached for comment on Monday, but her lawyer, Robert Barnes, said in a statement that she would be found not guilty and he criticized what he called a “cancel culture epidemic” for a rush to judgment.
“She lost her job, her home, and her public life,” Mr. Barnes said. “Now some demand her freedom? How many lives are we going to destroy over misunderstood 60-second videos on social media?”
Mr. Cooper, who has expressed deep ambivalence about the severity of the public response to Ms. Cooper’s actions, said on Monday that he “had zero involvement” in the district attorney’s case against her.a
Asked to comment on the pending charge, he said, “I have no reaction.”
People are rarely charged with filing a false police report, legal experts said, because the authorities do not want to discourage the reporting of crimes and because it can be difficult to prove that a person made a false report knowingly.
But experts said that the evidence in the case against Ms. Cooper was strong and that it could have broader implications in other instances of white people making false police reports against Black people.
“To the extent that this woman was arguably deploying racial stereotypes and weaponizing them, it will make people think twice,” said Nancy Gertner, a Harvard Law School professor and a retired federal judge. “It is a big deal.”"
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