Rochester's phantom fight?

January 17, 2012 at 11:14am

This is bizarre.

I'm sure you've heard about the big fight at the Liberty Pole last week. As many as 200 kids walked down there after a planned fight at East High was disrupted by administrators and police. The Democrat and Chronicle has reported, directly and indirectly, on the alleged incident a few times since.

Here's the thing, though: the police say the fight never happened. When I called the police department about it, here's the response I got from RPD spokesperson Stephen Scott:

"There was no fight at the Liberty Pole last week. How it got blown out of proportion and mis-reported remains a mystery to me. The deal is this: School administrators learned of a fight that was being planned by students on Facebook to occur at East High School. Police were called and we were able to avert any such event from happening at the school. Students, we're estimating about 200, then started walking to the downtown area. Officers had already been reinforced downtown due to the earlier Facebook finding and no fights occurred at the Liberty Pole.

"There were a few skirmishes in the area as the kids were on their way to downtown near University and Main St. In all, seven kids (I don't have ages, but teenagers) were arrested in relation to this incident. Charges were disorderly conduct.

There were no weapons involved and no one was injured."

Are the "skirmishes" the fight that the D&C referred to? Is one side, intentionally or not, mischaracterizing the incident? If this truly was no big deal, you'd think the mayor would come out and say so, because as it stands, the story bolsters MCC's argument that downtown is not safe.

The only part of the story we can independently verify is the fact that hundreds of kids were on Main Street, headed downtown around the time of the alleged incident. They were spotted by a couple of our employees.

So what's going on? Any witnesses out there?

Comments for "Rochester's phantom fight?" (5)

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Jay Partyka said on Jan. 18, 2012 at 9:33am

That day the bus I take home from work was running late. The driver said he was late because traffic was being blocked by all of the police cars that were responding to a fight Downtown.

My bus does go by Main & University, so its possible it was police there that was holding up the bus and not the Liberty Pole.

Jay Partyka said on Jan. 18, 2012 at 11:54am

I was thinking about this further and I remembered something.

There is a police trailer parked across the street from the Liberty Pole. It is behind the fence used to close off the Midtown site. It has a blue light camera that I assume is used to monitor what's going on at the Liberty Pole.

It would be nice if the police could make that footage public.

James Thompson said on Jan. 18, 2012 at 12:16pm

It would certainly be good if camera footage could be seen. I must say that even seven students arrested is a cause for concern, and can lessen the image of downtown safety. But that is nothing like the image of scores of students fighting that was conjured up by the previous reports. It is quite strange. however, I didn't read the D&C article, so now I'll have to try to go back to verify what was written. It does sound as though a city official needs to publicly clarify what happened.

CitizenCandyKane said on Jan. 18, 2012 at 5:43pm

When I read about the RPD's contention that an incideent on Main Street involving scores of young people had been "blown out of proportion and mis-reported" I at first assumed they were talking about the anti-war march that they broke up in October 2010.

As I recall, rather than a "phantom fight", the appearance on the scene back then of 20 cop cars and 80 club-swing cops was triggered by a "phantom blocking of an emergency vehicle". Heads were busted and protectors arrested, but to date the RPD has been unable to provide any film from the myriad street cameras which could back their claim that the marchers did any thing more disruptive to the emergency vehicle than to stand there and watch it drive by. (I believe that the RPD's excuse was that, quite coincidently, the street surveillance cameras that covered the area in question mysteriously malfunctioned at the exact time that the "phantom blocking" was occurring.)

And like the "phanton fight" the local media botched the story and never bothered to follow up.

bknrd said on Jan. 19, 2012 at 10:52pm

@ Jay- Those blue flashing cameras don't actually work. They're simply put, a crime deterrent. If they did work, the RPD would have been able to see the guy that stole my motorcycle. What two different officers told me on separate occasions, the orbs haven't been cleaned once since they've been installed. Not once. We bought 'em for nothing.

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