Soldier punches Black man for spitting on his car and 'disparaging' Army, sits on his chest till cops arrive
A disturbing video doing the rounds of social media has sparked outrage after it appeared to show a White man in military fatigues punching a Black man multiple times in the face, pinning him to the ground, and sitting on his chest. The incident reportedly occurred along Elmwood Avenue, in Buffalo, on Thursday afternoon, September 3.
The video, recorded by a bystander, showed the Black man walking towards the White soldier and lunging toward him. The solider then punches the man in the face and forces him to ground, ultimately sitting on his chest. The soldiers then yells for someone to "call the police." The commotion then attracts a lot of bystanders who rush toward the scene, asking the man in military fatigues to "stop" what he is doing.
The clip continues to show the soldier sitting on the Black man, who is seen wriggling under the White man's weight as he struggles to free himself and screams "get the f*** off of me." When the solider continues to sit on the man's chest, a bystander angrily asks the solider whether he is a "White supremacist or something."
"This isn’t about race. Don’t make it about race," another bystander says, adding that they do not know the full story of what happened. The second bystander also adds that the man being pinned down by the soldier was causing issues in the area and police had been called. Daily Mail reported that the video was taken by a bystander identified as Said Hamideh, who said that according to his understanding, the incident began when the Black man spat on the soldier's car. The pair then exchanged words and the man made disparaging remarks about the military to the solider and then called him a "p****."
The witness said that he watched in shock as the man approached the solider, who laid a "haymaker" of a punch to the man's head. The soldier then hit the man a few times. It was then when Hamideh began filming the incident. He believes that the Black man was suffering from mental illness.
The clip also shows the second bystander asking others to step back and give some space to the soldier. "You do not know what’s been happening all day. At least understand the facts before you open your mouth. You have no business here, back away," he says. At that moment a woman runs toward the scene of the incident and slams the solider, saying she saw him run over to the Black man and "pummel him for no reason." When the second bystander interjects saying that the man had "spat on the soldier's car, you think that’s fair?" The woman then responds saying punching someone multiple times for spitting on their car is "not a fair exchange."
Another bystander, at that moment, calls out to the soldier, saying: "You think you’re entitled because you’re in the army? Go f*** yourself dude" and invites him to fight him instead. Hamideh then asks the man pinned to the ground if he was able to breathe, to which the man replied with: "Oh yeah man, I’m good. I’ve been waiting for this." More bystanders join in by this point, including a man in a wheelchair holding a metal baseball bat. The man asks the soldier: "Are you hitting people? Are you hitting our people?" The solider then replies saying: "Oh yeah, I hit him." The man in the wheelchair, who is Black, then accuses the soldier of racism.
The soldier then responds, saying: "I see a man as a man. He’s yelling and shouting at people in the street, then he comes over and spits on my car. Then he turned around on me. I’m not going to let him hit me first, man." The man in the wheelchair then asks the solider to move, to which the solider responds with saying he is not going to let him get up and start hitting him.
The police arrives at that moment and the solider immediately gets up and walks away while the pinned man continues lying on the floor. The video cuts out as bystanders ask the police to arrest the solider. It is not yet certain whether either the solider or the pinned man were arrested in the incident.