CHARLOTTE, N.C. (WJZY) – A North Carolina mother says her 12-year-old son is traumatized after police handcuffed him and took him to jail.
The boy was charged with reckless driving while riding his bicycle last weekend in Charlotte.
A passerby captured footage of Prince Ervin in handcuffs in the back of a CMPD car this past Sunday. The video depicts onlookers questioning the officers about the situation.
“What crime did he commit?” a man asked.
“Reckless driving,” an officer responded.
“Reckless driving on a bicycle,” the man said. “Did he hit a car?”
“Doesn’t have to hit a car,” the officer said.
Prince’s mom, Jasmine Ervin, says she picked her son up at the jail after a panicked call from one of his friends.
“Terrified, traumatized: that’s how he feels,” Jasmine Ervin said. “He shouldn’t have to [feel that].”
Prince says he was riding his bike with a group of more than 50 people of all ages.
He noticed a police car trailing them for a few blocks. Prince says the lights flipped on, and a chase began.
“He struck my friend’s bike,” Prince explained. “He essentially attempted to knock him off the bike. I wasn’t going to stick around for them to try the same thing on me.”
Once alone, Prince said officers caught up to him when he blew a tire.
“When I was putting my hands behind my back, I was on the ground, so when they were picking me up, they were still manhandling me,” Prince said.
Jasmine Ervin says the experience has taken away her child’s innocence.
“You want to feel secure and protected,” she expressed. “A large man is pursuing you with a car while you’re just a kid on a bike. What do you think he will do to you if he has already hit one of your friends?”
Information on the case is limited because Prince is a minor, but Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police released a statement:
Officers took action to ensure the safety of the individual featured in the video, based on the circumstances present at that time. The department’s Central Division frequently responds to calls about people riding bicycles in ways that could be dangerous to themselves or others on city streets.
This arrest is part of an ongoing situation that began three years ago when the city took measures against large groups of young cyclists, some of whom had been accused of confronting traffic aggressively and occasionally resorting to violence against motorists.
Prince and his mother say Sunday’s incident was not related to any “gang,” and he was just out for a ride.
Prince hasn’t gotten his bike back, but in a remarkable act of kindness, the man who recorded the arrest bought Prince a new one.
Ervin and her son are both grateful.
“He’s just a child,” emphasized Jasmine Ervin. “He’s a young Black boy. He is my child, and he matters, and that’s what I want people to understand. They will not treat my son in that manner, because it is unacceptable. He is not an animal.”
CMPD says the case is an active investigation. Ervin says she spoke with CMPD’s Internal Affairs Department on Thursday.
