By Isaac Gleitz | The Statehouse File
For The Republic
INDIANAPOLIS — The Indiana State Police are investigating a complaint that a trooper with the Capitol Police racially profiled state Sen. Eddie Melton, D-Merrillville, during a rally to celebrate Black leaders in politics at the Indiana Statehouse.
First Sergeant Ron Galaviz said the Indiana State Police Department received a complaint Monday and is currently looking into the encounter. Witnesses said the incident happened at the “Beyond the Big Tent – Black Voices in Politics” rally hosted on Saturday by the Indiana Racial Justice Alliance and two Democrats running for state office.
Belinda Drake, who was a speaker at the event and is running for a state Senate seat in District 32, said officers approached the demonstrators after they moved inside when it began to rain. She said the troopers ran from the other side of the Statehouse as if they were on a mission to address a safety threat.
In a statement, Drake said Melton and Sen. J.D. Ford, D-Indianapolis, went to speak with the troopers. It was then that one of the troopers began shouting at Melton, Drake said, and demanding that he “freeze.” Drake said the trooper then “popped the clip on his firearm holster, presumably in preparation to draw his weapon” at Melton. Drake said she then saw Ford attempt to deescalate the encounter.
Melton and Ford released a joint statement Monday reacting to the incident, but neither responded immediately to a request for an interview.
“It’s unfortunate that this situation had to take place,” Sen. Melton said. “I want to be clear that I don’t want this situation to become a distraction from the work that we’re doing through the Indiana Black Legislative Caucus on our police reform agenda.”
Drake said the crowd was having a meaningful, respectful and quiet protest, but they were interrupted by police aggression. She said what happened was a racial profiling incident.
“Every Black man has to deal with this in Indiana. Every Black woman has to deal with this in Indiana. It doesn’t matter if you’re an elected official,” Drake said.
Ford reflected in a similar way.
“It is an unfortunate irony that my good friend and colleague Senator Eddie Melton experienced some of the same police bias we were there to speak out against. These kinds of incidents are all too common for Black and brown Hoosiers,” Ford said. “This situation was handled extremely poorly by the Capitol Police. No member of the public deserves to be treated that way, or spoken to so disrespectfully by officers who are there to serve the public.”
In her statement, Drake compared what she said happened to Melton to a recent incident at Monroe Lake near Bloomington, Indiana. Over the July 4 weekend, a Black man, Vauhxx Booker, said he was the victim of an “attempted lynching” when he and his friends visited the lake and were confronted by a group of white men. A video captured by Booker’s group shows the men pinning Booker to a tree and one calling him a racial slur.
“Last week, it was being Black in the woods. This week, it is being Black in the Statehouse,” Drake said.
For more on this story, see Wednesday’s Republic.
