Everyone in the Gibnut Street area knows community activist Gee Michael Reid. And with the years he's worked with the police department, a lot of officers know him as well. Except one who he recently had an altercation with. Reid - who has rheumatoid arthritis - told us that an accident near the canal led to the officer slamming a car door on his foot. Here's how he explained it.
G Michael Reid, Community Activist
"And upon reaching the bridge, you know that you can only turn left. There's a dead end right there. And there was a vehicle parked on the bridge that was loading up stuff off of the market, which I think should never be allowed."
"But he's there, when I dropped off a couple of kids right on the corner, so I pulled out and I had to go around the vehicle parked on the bridge to get over. When I heard a bang on the side of my vehicle and so I pulled up and pulled over."
"Lo and behold, I see a police officer in full uniform, a camouflage type uniform, coming towards the vehicle and I'm inquiring as to what happened, did you hit my vehicle or something. And the man went off, he went ballistic and threatening and all kind of thing."
"I tried to get out to see what he was saying. The man took the door and slammed it on my foot. And I'm saying, sir, really, I am trying figure out what's going on here. I didn't know. I never saw him in front of me or anything like that on the side of me."
"And the kids as a consequence of the way this man was going on jumped out of the car and run and I'm saying to him, listen I have to secure the interests of these children. No, no, he just, wait stay there. Reach in my car, pull out my keys and tell me, stay. Let me call my mobile and he call the mobile and the mobile come. And then I'm telling him, sir, you've been very aggressive. I say, that uniform doesn't give you a right to abuse people. Oh, wait, you want to talk? Watch what will happen. Tell the driver of the mobile to leave. I will take care of this myself, you don't have to report this, I will handle it. And I'm there thinking, well, this man is going crazy. Fortunately, the driver, I believe, recognized me and he said, you know what? Let us wait for the traffic people personnel to come. So they informed the traffic and they came after a while about five minutes. and this man has is continuing all the threats of what he will do and that he will take off the uniform at some point and I don't have to worry about him being in a uniform. And I don't know that the man even to that point recognized me. As you know, I worked many years for the police department and I found ironic that in room that they took me into to interview me when I made a report to the police was in a very office that I had for seven years."
"I was there with the police. And to his credit, he was civil and he gave me a paper to go to the doctor and whatnot. So I did go to the hospital. The Doctor certified it as harm since my foot had already been in bad shape, but this did even more."
