Citizens were outraged, and at least one Urbana Council member left speechless, after Council member Shirese Hursey placed full blame for the violent arrest of Aleyah Lewis (original article here) squarely on Lewis herself. Hursey’s monologue was delivered at the May 4th, 2020 Urbana City Council meeting, immediately after 20 citizens spoke to criticize the April 27th Urbana Police presentation about the arrest (article on April 27th UPD presentation here, and article on public response here).
Hursey spoke for seven minutes straight, arguing that Lewis was fully at-fault for the Urbana Police Officers having used violent force, such as tackling her, punching her in the head, and knee-kicking her in the ribs while she was pinned to the ground. Hursey further argued that any additional abuse that Lewis suffered in the jail is of no concern to the Urbana City Council since the jail, even though it lies squarely within Urbana, is actually an entity of the Champaign County Government.
Throughout her speech, Hursey continued to refer to the 911 call that sparked the Urbana Police response as a “shots fired call”, even though the call appeared to be more of a medical call – indicating that someone had accidentally shot themselves while carrying a gun in their waistband. There was never any indication that anyone was threatening anyone or that the situation was anything more than an accidental discharge. At no point did Hursey indicate that Urbana Police officers could have done a better job handling the situation.
Hursey also condemned the tone of the many citizens who have spoken publicly about the incident, arguing that people are giving “demands” instead of trying to have a dialogue. As it happens, multiple citizens had specifically asked for a “dialogue” during public input over the past few weeks, but Council members had initially refused to comment on the incident.
Shirese Hursey:
“I think all of us need to take a kinda, calm down for a minute, just take it down a notch, and actually look at how this particular situation has gone from, instead being, you know, people being proactive, everything is reactive. And umm, it bothers me that we do not, we are not, dialoging. I get emails, and I’m sure that uh, my fellow council members are getting emails of everybody talking at us, and telling us their demands, uhh, regarding things that we actually have to no power to do anything about. That goes to the State’s Attorney’s Office. The one person that would have had more power to do anything about it is Aleyah Lewis herself. We would not be having these discussions had she only complied. And um, sorry to say that, but that is how it is when you deal with police. As a black woman, since everyone wants to bring up the blackness of her. As a black woman having lived in Los Angeles County for thirty years, having been brought up, raised, in uh, graduating from Urbana High, here, I understand what that means. And having a degree in African America studies and actually studied what kind of, uh, issues we have from the black community regarding law enforcement nationwide, not just in Urbana, I understand that.”
Hursey also said that there was no indication that Lewis was Tased while in the jail, and that Lewis herself hadn’t presented any evidence to indicate that she was mistreated. Hursey said that Lewis did not appear to be injured in any way, even though the jail video shows Lewis rubbing the sores on her scraped hands. Within minutes of making these claims, citizens emailed jail records to the Council which show that Lewis was forcibly stripped naked and Tased twice in the jail. Hursey’s response was to again argue that Sheriff’s Department issues are of no concern to the Urbana Council.
Hursey then indicated, without any particular concern or consternation, that Lewis very well may have been killed by Urbana Police:
“The other thing I also understand is mutual respect. And I also understand that you have to live through a particular situation in order to even get through it. One of those ways to do that, a lot of times, is to do what the police ask you to do. Nothing happened, uh, to the gentleman that was arrest for carrying a gun. Nothing happened, uh, violently, to the gentlemen that was stopped, before they even came across them.”
Perhaps the most remarkable proclamation by Hursey was that since Lewis allegedly tried to spit on the officers who had just tackled and beat her, Lewis deserved to be brutalized. Hursey placed the brutality inflicted upon Lewis next to the alleged spitting attempt, and said “doesn’t that put her in the same tea kettle, so to speak?”
Urbana Council member Jared Miller, normally steely-eyed and strong in composure during Council meetings, was visibly and audibly shaken by Hursey’s comments. In a moderately broken voice, Miller said,
“I am very, very, upset by what Shirese had to say about this, and I am not in an emotional state to make a comment about it, so I am going to refrain from doing so. But I want the people who are listening to understand that Shirese does not, in any way, speak for the entire Council, nor for everyone who is here. Those are her comments and her opinions about what happened, and I vehemently disagree with a number of them, but I’m not going to get into that tonight.”