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, 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 confrontation between Ms. Cooper and Mr. Cooper, who are not related, occurred when she encountered him in the Ramble, a semi-wild area where dogs must be leashed and hers was not.
Mr. Cooper said he asked Ms. Cooper to leash her dog. When she refused, he said, he tried to lure the dog with treats in hopes of compelling her to restrain her pet.
The encounter turned ugly when Ms. Cooper told Mr. Cooper that she was calling the police and that she planned to tell them an African-American man was threatening her life.
Mr. Cooper’s camera captured what happened next.
“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,” Ms. Cooper, gripping her dog’s collar tightly, says in a hysterical tone to the 911 operator.
Then, before ending the call, she adds, “I am being threatened by a man in the Ramble, please send the cops immediately!”
“Thank you,” Mr. Cooper says after she puts her dog’s leash on, just before the video ends.
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Video: Video Shows White Woman Calling Police on Black ...
Mr. Cooper, 57, a Harvard graduate who works in communications, has long been a prominent birder in the city and is on the board of the New York City Audubon Society.
Shortly after video of the episode went viral, Ms. Cooper surrendered her dog, Henry, to the cocker spaniel rescue group she had adopted him from two years earlier. She and the dog have since been reunited (Ransom 1-3)
Christian Cooper, the Black man who filmed a White woman calling the police on him while he was birdwatching in Central Park in May, has not cooperated with the Manhattan district attorney's investigation, The New York Times reported Tuesday.
"On the one hand, she's already paid a steep price," Cooper said in a statement, according to the Times. "That's not enough of a deterrent to others? Bringing her more misery just seems like piling on."
On Monday, the Manhattan district attorney announced plans to prosecute the woman, Amy Cooper ... on a charge of falsely reporting an incident in the third degree. She has been issued a desk appearance ticket and is scheduled for arraignment October 14.
Christian Cooper expressed his personal ambivalence with the prosecution in his statement to the Times.
"So if the DA feels the need to pursue charges, he should pursue charges. But he can do that without me," he said.
An attorney for Amy Cooper said on Tuesday that she would be acquitted and decried the rise of "cancel culture."
"When all the facts are known, Amy Cooper will be found not guilty of the single misdemeanor charge she faces," attorney Robert Barnes said in a statement. "Based on a misunderstood 60 seconds of video, she lost her job, her home and her reputation.
"Public shaming, lost employment, denied benefits & now prison time for a mis-perceived, momentary alleged 'wrong think'? For words said in a sixty second interaction where even the alleged victim calls this reaction way excessive? This criminalized, cancel culture is cancerous & precarious. That is why acquitting Amy Cooper is important" (Joseph and Levenson 1-2).
"I think it's a mistake to focus on this one individual," Cooper wrote in an Opinion piece Monday in The Washington Post. "The important thing the incident highlights is the long-standing, deep-seated racial bias against us black and brown folk that permeates the United States."
...
I'm ambivalent about the prosecution and have chosen not to aid the investigation," Cooper wrote.
"Focusing on charging Amy Cooper lets white people off the hook from all that," he added.
"They can scream for her head while leaving their own prejudices unexamined. They can push for her prosecution and pat themselves on the back for having done something about racism, when they've actually done nothing, and their own Amy Cooper remains only one purse-clutch in the presence of a black man away" (Sanchez and Joseph 1).
… there was a second, previously unreported call between Cooper and 911. A 911 dispatcher called Cooper back and she repeated the accusation, adding that the man "tried to assault her," the DA's office said.
"When responding officers arrived, Ms. Cooper admitted that the male had not 'tried to assault' or come into contact with her," a release from the DA's office said (Levenson and Sgueglia 1).
Ms. Cooper, 41, who had been a head of insurance portfolio management at Franklin Templeton, was fired from her job after the confrontation with Mr. Cooper.
She ... issued a public apology and tried to explain her response.
“I reacted emotionally and made false assumptions about his intentions when, in fact, I was the one who was acting inappropriately by not having my dog on a leash,” Ms. Cooper said in the statement.
She added that when Mr. Cooper said she would not like what he was “going to do next” and then offered her dog treats, she assumed he was threatening her. Mr. Cooper said the remark was merely meant to signal that he planned to offer the treats.
“I assumed we were being threatened when all he had intended to do was record our encounter on his phone,” Ms. Cooper said (Ransom 4).
...
"I'm not a racist. I did not mean to harm that man in any way," she said, adding that she also didn't mean any harm to the African American community.
Christian Cooper has acknowledged her apology but said her act was racist.
"I think her apology is sincere," Cooper told CNN's Don Lemon. "I'm not sure that in that apology she recognizes that while she may not be or consider herself a racist, that particular act was definitely racist" (Joseph and Levenson 3).
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Christian Cooper on being racially targeted while ...
Amy Cooper … had her misdemeanor charge ... dropped on Tuesday.
...
"Given the issues at hand and Ms. Cooper's lack of criminal background, we offered her, consistent with our position on many misdemeanor cases involving a first arrest, an alternative, restorative justice resolution," Assistant District Attorney Joan Illuzzi told a Manhattan judge, according to a statement provided to NPR.
The program, Illuzzi explained, is "designed not just to punish but to educate and promote community healing."
Illuzzi said Cooper completed a total of five sessions and that her therapist described it as a "moving experience," adding that Amy Cooper "learned a lot in their sessions together."
Because Cooper completed the restorative justice sessions to the prosecutor's satisfaction, the Manhattan District Attorney's office moved to dismiss the charge.
The judge then granted a motion to dismiss, according to the District Attorney's Office statement.
It also noted that Christian Cooper declined to participate in the criminal justice process, but added the District Attorney's Office went forward with the proceedings because it determined the offense was not just against Cooper, but also "a threat to the community if allowed to go unchecked."
"The simple principle is that one cannot use the police to threaten another and in this case, in a racially offensive and charged manner," the statement read (Booker 1-2).
Commentary
Though Amy Cooper has since apologized for her behavior and actions in Central Park, she still describes herself in victim terms. She has stated that her life is being “destroyed” by others since Christian Cooper’s Facebook video went viral. In apologizing, Amy says that “words are just words and I can’t undo what I did, but I sincerely and humbly apologize to everyone.” Oh—will someone help me tell Amy Cooper that it was about so much more than words?
What happened in Central Park has far reaching consequences and was about so much more than words. That apology apparently wasn’t enough for her to hold on to her job with Franklin Templeton, and it won’t be enough for her to rebuild her reputation and career either because you first have to own what you did before you can successfully repair it.
1. Amy Cooper leaned on white privilege and demonstrated blatant racism.
Amy Cooper was the one breaking the rules in Central Park that day. She was walking her dog in an area that explicitly calls for dogs to be put on a leash. Yet upon being asked to follow this rule, Amy responded with the kind of superiority and indignation that could only be read as white privilege. Her next move was to put race smack dab in the middle of the episode by emphasizing Christian Cooper’s race and placing heavy importance on him being an “African American man.” She wasn’t just calling the police to claim that a man was threatening her. She went out of her way to let Christian know that if he didn’t stop recording her, she could get back at him by using her privilege to cry out that an “African American man” was the one doing the deed.
Before actually calling the police, Amy Cooper first threatened to do so. In doing this, she was letting Christian Cooper know in the most pressing way she could that she had power over him; that she could use her race and gender to get over on him; that she could truly hurt—even destroy—him with one phone call. Then she followed through on the threat and set things in motion for him to suffer for even daring to request that she put a leash on her dog. Amy Cooper decided that Christian Cooper would indeed suffer for having the audacity to challenge her power and her privilege.
The behavior displayed on the video is arguably racism. I don’t know if Amy Cooper is racist or not, but her behavior on the Monday in question was indistinguishable from what most people expect from racists. Using nothing but the color of his skin, Amy sent the message that she was superior to Christian and that he needed to step back in his place because he was a black man. That is racist, and that kind of behavior can damage reputations and careers. It also damages a leader’s credibility. And based on these messages, Franklin Templeton seems to think so as well.
2. Amy Cooper conjured up memories of Emmett Till and the white woman who lied on him.
The first thing I thought about after watching Christian Cooper’s Facebook video was the Emmett Till case. I have studied the Till case in recent years, and the ease at which Amy Cooper lied is one of the most frightening things she did that day. It was remarkable to see how winning in that moment would cause Amy to create an entirely false narrative and then do whatever she felt necessary on the call with the 911 operator to get officials to believe the lie. Watching this uncomfortable and angry white woman go to unthinkable extremes to make a point is so doggone frightening that it scares me to think of what would have happened had Christian not had the video recording.
Emmett Till was a 14-year-old black boy from Chicago. In 1955, his mom begrudgingly allowed him to visit relatives in Mississippi. He was murdered three days after entering a local store when the clerk, a 21-year-old white woman, told people, “I was just scared to death” of Emmett Till. She claimed that Emmett had been inappropriate and whistled at her among other things. The result was that Emmett Till was kidnapped from the home he was staying, tortured for hours and then brutally murdered.
52 years later, Carolyn Bryant Dunham, admitted that she lied and made the story up. ...
Things in Central Park between Amy Cooper and Christian Cooper could have ended similarly horribly. If there wasn’t video for this incident, how far would Amy Cooper have taken her lie? If there had not been video, what horrors would Amy Cooper have brought down upon Christian Cooper’s life?
3. Amy Cooper weaponized police against Christian Cooper by feigning assault.
When Amy Cooper exalted her voice and played damsel in distress on the 911 call, she put Christian Cooper’s life on the line. Notice in the above video just how dramatic Amy Cooper became. To increase the sense of urgency for police, she changed her demeanor, raised her voice inflections, and heightened her cries and animations all in an attempt to get police on the scene ASAP. She put it all on the line to ensure that the person on the other end of the 911 call would believe that she was indeed being assaulted. She was trying to ensure that the only impression the individual could get was that her very life may be taken if he or she didn’t act quickly.
With her performance, Amy Cooper raised the stakes and increased the likelihood that police would not just show up to Central Park, but they would show up with guns drawn ready to cause immediate harm to Christian Cooper. She raised the stakes to make police prepared to do whatever they needed to do to ensure her safety.
The very message Amy Cooper was sending to Christian Cooper was that police exist to serve and protect her. She was sending a loud and clear message that she believes police work for her good and will work to Christian’s bad. Her actions left no doubt that she believes that police will do whatever she wants—even arrest, brutalize or kill Christian Cooper—and she was determined to punish him. And all of it was predicated upon the fact that Amy is white and Christian is black.
Again, Amy Cooper says that others are now destroying her life. That is where she is wrong. She did this. She ruined her reputation and career, and until she owns her part in it, nothing will get better. We all make mistakes as human beings. Sometimes we do bad things, but we can certainly repair and rebuild—and Amy Cooper can too. I firmly believe that she can repair this damage. She can rebuild her reputation and career, but first she has to take full responsibility for destroying it.
I recommend that instead of complaining about how her life is now destroyed, Amy Cooper should reflect on how so many people now believe that she tried to destroy Christian Cooper’s life. And instead of apologizing by saying that she basically used bad words on Monday, Amy needs to reflect on the above three things she did that caused harm to her own reputation and career. After this, she can work to successfully repair the damage (Allen 1-3).
Works cited:
Allen, Terina. “3 Things Amy Cooper Did in Central Park To Damage Her Reputation and Career.” Forbes, May 29, 2020. Net. https://www.forbes.com/sites/terinaallen/2020/05/29/3-things-amy-cooper-did-in-central-park-that-destroyed-her-life/?sh=e4900f76198f
Booker, Brakkton. “Amy Cooper, White Woman Who Called Police on Black Bird-Watcher, Has Charge Dismissed.” NPR, February 16, 2021. Net. https://www.npr.org/2021/02/16/968372253/white-woman-who-called-police-on-black-man-bird-watching-has-charges-dismissed
Joseph, Elizabeth and Levenson, Eric. “Black Birdwatcher in Central Park 911 Call Doesn't Want To Be Involved in Prosecution of Amy Cooper, NYT Reports.” CNN, updated July 8, 2020. Net. https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/08/us/christian-cooper-central-park/index.html
Levenson, Eric and Sgueglia, Kristina. “There Were Two Calls between Amy Cooper and 911 about a Black Birdwatcher in Central Park, Prosecutors Say.” CNN, updated November 17, 2020. Net. https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/14/us/amy-cooper-central-park-racism/index.html
Ransom, Jan. “Amy Cooper Faces Charges after Calling Police on Black Bird-Watcher.” The New York Times, October 14, 2020. Net. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/06/nyregion/amy-cooper-false-report-charge.html
Sanchez, Ray and Joseph, Elizabeth. “Black Birdwatcher Christian Cooper Says Prosecuting Amy Cooper 'Lets White People off the Hook.'” CNN, updated July 15, 2020. Net. https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/15/us/christian-cooper-central-park-op-ed/index.html
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