African-American residents marched through the Southeast Georgia town of Pembroke Monday night, demanding the town's police chief step down following an incident they label "19-50's style" police brutality.
About fourty protesters participated in the march, carrying signs that read, "Stop the Silence" and "Justice for the Ellabelle Six." That's a reference to the six self-described "poor black" residents of a rural Bryan County community who were arrested on various charges after police beat and tased one of them in mid-April. Police say, they were responding to threats.
The NAACP's Dave Williams says, it was unprovoked attack. "That day, Tommy Lee wasn't doing anything," Williams said. "He was standing in his grandmother's yard. He wasn't doing anything."
White and black residents have vastly different accounts not only of what happened that day, but also of the character of the officer most involved in the incident, Mark Crowe. Blacks say, he used racial epithets. The majority-white town council elevated him to police chief following the incident.
AUDIO: Two views of Pembroke's new police chief by Dave Williams, NAACP, and BJ Clark, friend of Chief Mark Crowe.
photo credit: Renea Camper
