Black USPS Worker Wrongfully Stopped and Detained By California Police Has Filed Lawsuit
A California postal worker was stopped and detained by police in August filed a lawsuit against the city of San Rafael. Karl Bracy has worked for the US Postal Service for 21 years, was on his way home from work in Aug.7 when he was stopped and handcuffed by police.
Police were looking for a stolen white Chevy Impala which was believed to be driven by an armed individual. Bracy was still wearing his work uniform at the time of the encounter, was driving a white Chevy Malibu.
“I was shook, scared, thinking of what’s going on in the world today, thinking that I was actually going to be shot,” Bracy told ABC 7. Attorney John Burris Bracy “was wrongfully stopped, detained, and handcuffed by the police for being a person suspected of carjacking.”
“A police officer loudly ordered him out of the car at gunpoint. Bracy noted that there were at least three other officers present with guns drawn,” the attorney’s office stated according to the news outlet.
San Rafael Police Department released footage of the incident in September, calling the stop a “mistake.”
“We made a mistake. This kind of mistake is rare, but it happens,” Police Chief Diana Bishop said.
Burris says police should have gathered more information about the person they were searching for before stopping Bracy. “It’s very disturbing because all you really had was a Black man in a car,” said Burris.
Police said they were not aware that Bracy was Black until after he got out of the car.
The video of the arrest shows one officer telling Bracy it became clear that they had stopped the wrong vehicle after police noticed stickers on the side of the car that didn’t match the description on the vehicle they were looking for.
“No problem man,” Bracy said once the officer apologized.
“I really think I got out of there because I had the mailman uniform on. I was just another Black man trying to go home from work,” Bracy said during a Oct. 29 conference. Bracy said during an Oct. 29 conference. Bracy has since taken leave from his job and is now under psychiatric care and taking medication.
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