[gentle brass music]
- Alex: We never talked about race growing up.
I just don't think that was ever a conversation.
- Patsy: I thought that love would conquer all
and skin color really didn't matter.
I had to learn the really hard way
when they almost killed you. - Alex: Yeah.
I was 19 years old.
I had picked up a friend, and I noticed that
we had red and blue lights behind us.
We were being pulled over.
The officer explained I had made an illegal left turn
and to step out of the car.
So I get out of the car first.
He pats me down and then he goes around to the passenger side
and pulls my friend Addison out of the car.
- Patsy: Addison is white. - Alex: Yeah, Addison is white.
And he had some weed in his coat pocket,
so he gets placed in handcuffs.
I figure that everything's okay.
I'm not in handcuffs, I've already been patted down,
plus there's three officers on the scene.
And I had never had a negative interaction with police
in my life.
So I asked them, "Can I please see a warrant
before you continue the search?"
And they grabbed me and began to hit me in the face.
I could hear Addison in the background yelling, "Stop!
Leave him alone!"
I was hit several times, and I remember gasping for air
and spitting, and blood flying across the grass.
And then I hear an officer shout out,
"He's reaching for her gun!"
I immediately started yelling, "No, I'm not!
I'm not reaching for anything!"
And I remember an officer say, "If he doesn't calm down,
we're gonna have to shoot him."
I could feel the gun pressed to my head.
I expected to be shot.
And at that point, I lost consciousness.
I woke up to a multitude of officers
just standing around me, laughing.
One officer was like, "Where's that warrant now, you ####?"
It took 45 stitches to close up the lacerations
in my face alone.
How did it feel when you finally saw me?
- Patsy: All I remember is involuntarily screaming.
- Alex: That was the first time I had cried
the entire time I had been in there.
And it wasn't my injuries that hurt.
It was just seeing how it devastated you.
- Patsy: My whole worldview changed that night.
- Alex: Yeah.
For me, it was the point of awakening
to how the rest of the world is gonna look at you.
I was just another Black face in the streets.
And I was almost another dead Black male.
["The Temperature of the Air on the Bow of the Kaleetan" by Chris Zabriskie]