Activists arrested after Alamance County meeting ends abruptly without public comments

Three people were arrested Monday during an uproar prompted by the sudden end to an Alamance County Board of Commissioners meeting.

Supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement wanted to express their dismay at being pepper sprayed during a march to the polls two weeks ago.

But the chair of the all-Republican board, Amy Scott Galey, brought the meeting to a close before they got a chance to approach the podium.

Shortly thereafter, chaos erupted. Five people were arrested — three at the meeting and two later Monday night at the county jail on charges of disorderly conduct and resisting a public officer. In another corner of the observation gallery, a conflict involving a newly elected county commissioner nearly came to blows.

The arrests were the latest in an ever-escalating conflict that has divided the small town of Graham, which at least one public official has likened to the fictional idyll of Mayberry. Demonstrations, counter-demonstrations, displays of law enforcement might and sometimes fisticuffs are commonplace in the square that surrounds the courthouse and the Confederate monument that sits outside its front door.

From the perspective of Black Lives Matter supporters, Monday’s arrests were the continuation of an effort to squash their calls for change.

But Tuesday, Galey said that wasn’t the case. She said she made the decision when someone in the audience called out, “Why isn’t she wearing a mask?”

She found the tone of the question hostile, Galey told The News & Observer in an interview, and she didn’t know who the question was referring to. While some county officials were not wearing masks, she and the interim health director, also a woman, wore face coverings required by the governor to help prevent transmission of COVID-19.

Galey announced the board would reconvene virtually two days later.

The audience erupted with people calling out, “Will public comments be allowed?”

Among the things they wanted to talk about was the sheriff’s deputies use of force on them. They felt that public officials had become inaccessible after they, and some of their children, were pepper sprayed Oct. 31, in an incident that attracted national attention.

Within minutes, three people attending the meeting were in handcuffs.

The sheriff’s office did not respond to The News & Observer’s request for an interview about Monday’s arrests.

A 28-year-old man who goes by Haikoo X said he was picked up and flung to the floor head first Monday after he called officers “pigs.”

“There was nothing threatening in my language,” he said Tuesday. “I was using my First Amendment rights, and I was walking peacefully out as I said it.”

He said he was thrown to the ground with officers applying pressure on top of him. As a result, he couldn’t comply with deputies’ orders to put his hands behind his back. After he was handcuffed, he was guided into an elevator, where he said a deputy slammed him into the wall.

Deputies had kept their attention on the man after he walked into the building, and after two moments of confusion over meeting logistics caused tempers to flare — first about how a ballistic vest must go through security, then about permissible seating. Haikoo X said he felt one specific deputy was trying to intimidate him.

Commissioner confrontation

The gallery of the Alamance County Historic Courthouse was filled largely with supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement. Clifton Carter, a member of Alamance Alliance for Justice, was on the agenda to speak. The Alliance had been part of the demonstrations on Oct. 31.

Carter said Commissioner Bill Lashley Jr., who was sitting unmasked in the gallery, turned to him and started pointing his finger toward him.

“He was extremely disrespectful,” said Carter, who attended the meeting in a suit. “He directed his anger at me, telling me I need to control my people.”

Carter said he told Lashley to “watch how he talks to a grown man.”

The two were soon separated, and Lashley apologized, Carter said. Lashley did not respond to The News & Observer’s request for an interview.

Galey called Carter afterward to hear his account of what happened.

“I have a lot of respect for him,” she said. She said she had not yet conferred with the county’s attorney about options for holding commissioners accountable for alleged misbehavior.

The Black Lives Matter supporters have been demonstrating for the removal of a Confederate monument in front of the courthouse and an end to systemic white supremacy for months, and in the process, dozens of people have been arrested. At least three ongoing lawsuits claim that protesters’ rights have been violated.

Haikoo X, a 47-year-old man and a 55-year-old woman were charged with resisting, delaying or obstructing a public officer for failing to heed officers’ directions to leave the meeting, disorderly conduct for interrupting a commissioners’ meeting and failing to heed officers’ directions to leave, and creating a disturbance, according to magistrate’s orders.

Two others were arrested later in the evening, charged with second-degree trespass for standing in the jail parking lot and resisting, delaying or obstructing a public officer for failing to leave the jail parking lot.

Galey, who recently was elected to the N.C. Senate, said in retrospect, it would have been better to give the audience more instructions about the rules of a government meeting and a warning about their decorum before ending the meeting.

A virtual continuation of the meeting was planned in advance, she said, due to complications associated with holding a public hearing while one commissioner was unable to attend in person. People who were registered to speak on Monday will be given an opportunity at the next meeting, she said.

“It was never anyone’s intention to keep anybody from commenting,” Galey said.

This story was originally published November 18, 2020 at 6:00 AM.