Tremaine McMillan, a 14-year-old black boy from Miami, FL, was assaulted by Miami-Dade police officers for giving them a “dehumanizing stare.”

Tremaine was feeding his puppy and playing when the officers approached him:

Fourteen-year-old Tremaine McMillan says he was feeding his puppy and playing on the beach with some friends when cops riding ATVs approached him and asked what he was doing. The “peacekeeping” officers say they saw McMillan roughhousing with another teenager, told him it was “unacceptable behavior,” and asked where his mother was. When McMillan walked away, they chased him on ATVs, jumped out, pinned him to the ground and arrested him. According to police reports, McMillan “attempted to pull his arm away, stating, ‘Man, don’t touch me like I did something.'”[…]

Miami-Dade Police Detective Alvaro Zabaleta justified the use of force, saying McMillan was exhibiting threatening “body language,” which includes “clenched fists.” McMillan adamantly denies this charge because, well, he was holding a puppy.

“Of course we have to neutralize the threat in front of us,” said Zabaleta.  “And when you have somebody that is being resistant, somebody that is pulling away from you, somebody that’s clenching their fist, somebody that’s flaring their arms, that’s the immediate threat.”

McMillan’s mother, Maurissa Holmes saw the incident and recorded it on her cell phone. She told WSVN-TV, “I ran over there and said, ‘That’s my son, that’s my son. Can you get off of him? He can’t breathe.’

 

Read more at Alternet.

 

We’re wondering how an unarmed boy with a 6-week old puppy in his hand is threatening to armed police officers.

We’re also wondering why McMillan has been charged and instead of dismissing the case, a judge has set a trial for July. 

 

At what point will this treatment, which is an unfortunate everyday occurrence for black youth, be permanently extinguished?

Thoughts?

Sound off below!