The Black man who was confronted in New York’s Central Park in May by a white woman who falsely told police “there’s an African American man threatening my life” is refusing to cooperate with the prosecution against her, according to The New York Times.
Christian Cooper, the bird-watcher who filmed the incident that went viral on social media, said authorities shouldn’t need his help to convict Amy Cooper and that her job loss, public embarrassment and charges may already be punishment enough.
“On the one hand, she’s already paid a steep price. That’s not enough of a deterrent to others? Bringing her more misery just seems like piling on. ... If the DA feels the need to pursue charges, he should pursue charges. But he can do that without me,” Christian Cooper told The New York Times on Tuesday.
Previously
Christian Cooper had already signaled his unwillingness to participate in any public backlash against Amy Cooper when he publicly condemned death threats she received in the days after the video emerged.
“I find it strange that people who were upset that ... that she tried to bring death by cop down on my head, I would then turn around and try to put death threats on her head. Where is the logic in that?” Christian said in an interview at the time. “Where does that make any kind of sense?”
Harvard graduate
Christian Cooper, 57, is a 1984 Harvard graduate. He works as a science editor at Health Science Communications.
He once worked as an editor for Marvel Comics and introduced the first gay character into Star Trek comics, according to the LGBT-interest magazine The Advocate.
Christian is also an avid bird-watcher, which is why he was at the park on Memorial Day.
What happened that day
Christian was in an area of the park known as the Ramble when he politely asked Amy Cooper if she could put her dog on a leash as park rules required. Instead, she called police.
As Christian began filming the episode, Amy Cooper can be seen grabbing her dog by the collar and lifting the animal off his front legs as she marched toward the man and pointed in his face.
Before placing the call, she tells Cooper: “I’m taking a picture and calling the cops,” she said. “I’m going to tell them there’s an African American man threatening my life.”
The two continue to exchange words until Amy Cooper, who was still holding the dog by the collar, retreated a few yards and called authorities.
As she continued to struggle with the dog, she falsely told emergency dispatchers that her life was in danger.
The video shows Christian Cooper never moved toward the woman as she tussled with her dog.
She then told authorities that an African American man with a bicycle helmet was recording her and “threatening myself and my dog.”
“Please send the cops immediately!” she yelled to the dispatcher. At that moment, Cooper hitched her dog’s collar again, and the animal struggled to break free from her grasp. “I’m being threatened by a man in the Ramble,” Amy Cooper yelled to the dispatcher while struggling to leash the dog. “Please send the cops immediately!” she yelled again.
Reaction, aftermath
The incident happened hours before George Floyd’s death.
Comments on Facebook and Twitter said the incident was a familiar reprise in modern society in which someone who is white calls authorities as a way of weaponizing the police against Black people.
Perpetrators of the incidents are now commonly referred to as “Karens.”
Days after the incident, New York lawmakers introduced legislation that would make false police reports against people of color a hate crime. Christian Cooper said his own awareness of racial profiling in America led him to record the confrontation with Amy Cooper.
“I videotaped it because I thought it was important to document things,” Christian Cooper told CNN after the incident. “Unfortunately, we live in an era with things like Ahmaud Arbery, where Black men are seen as targets,” he said, referring to the young Black man who was shot to death in February while jogging through a neighborhood in Brunswick, Georgia. “This woman thought she could exploit that to her advantage, and I wasn’t having it,” he said at the time.
Since the incident, Amy Cooper has revealed that her “entire life is being destroyed.” Social media activists took snapshots of her Facebook profile, which were widely shared to shame her.
“I’m not a racist,” she said the day after the incident. “I did not mean to harm that man in any way,” she said. “I think I was just scared. When you’re alone in the Ramble, you don’t know what’s happening. It’s not excusable, it’s not defensible.”
She was fired from the global investment firm Franklin Templeton a day after the incident.
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