When Mo was trying to appeal to Alvin to leave the store, Mo reached in to take the milk from Alvin. In his deposition, Alvin recalled: “So basically, as I'm trying to walk to the cash register just to go pay for my milk -- that's all I wanted to do was pay for my milk -- is when the one with the long hair [aka Mo] grabs my hand to get the milk out of my hand. That's when I tossed the milk to the side, didn't toss it at anyone, just tossed it to the side.”
In the video, Alvin can be seen snapping the milk across his chest in a wind-up, raising it above his head, and then slamming it to the ground, where it exploded. Mo can be seen backing away, while Willy is taking a drink of something he opened from the dairy isle. After Alivin threw the milk to the floor with a lot of force, the milk exploded. This is when Emad grabbed Alvin from behind and put Alvin to the ground.
THE TAKEDOWN
Alvin’s attorney asked Emad what he hoped to accomplish by throwing Alvin to the floor: “Not getting attacked with anything coming out of his pocket,” Emad responded. “My brother getting hurt or anything like that.”
Said Mo of that moment: “We didn't know what he was going to do, so with my brother trying to, you know, protect me or he thought he was going to take out something or anything like that, so he took him down.”
Emad walked away from the scene, and the 20 second video ends. What is not shown, but is described in Emad’s deposition, is Emad leaving the frame to get the police. Just before police arrived, Emad went back check on Alvin. Emad recalled: “He had gotten up. He stumbled a couple of times, dropped the Rice Crispy's and then I assisted him to sit onto the dairy cooler and told him to stay there.” The police arrived 2 minutes later, Emad said. The Rice Crispy’s were a snack that Alvin picked up.
Alvin’s attorney proceeded to again try to paint a picture of 3 against 1 in this situation, with Willy as the third. For those just seeing the 20 second video, and for those seeing the single photo in the Highlands Current, the public wrote their own story of Willy’s involvement.
Alvin’s Attorney: “So in the video of the actual incident it's you, your brother, and Willy all standing around or near Mr. Medina, three against one, right?”
Emad: “Willy wasn't in the picture to begin with. Willy was way out of the picture. He wasn't standing around him. He wasn't getting involved. He wasn't doing anything.”
Alvin’s Attorney: “But he was present?”
Emad: “Present doesn't mean you're involved.”
After Alvin was on the ground, Willy seemed to say something to Alvin and walk away.
FEELINGS AFTER IT ALL
Alvin's attorney then posed a different kind of question to Emad: "Do you think that he got what he deserved for what he did to you and your brother?"
Emad answered: "Not for what he did but for what to expect. I didn't know what to expect especially during the first interaction being threatened and saying about his family, we don't know who his family is and stuff like that so I didn't know what to expect and plus his hand was in his pocket so I wasn't 100% sure so I needed to do something.”
THE GUILTY PLEA
While the Highlands Current article said that Emad “conceded” to his plea, there is more to Emad’s feelings on his plea. The attorney asked Emad if he plead voluntarily. Emad answered: “Yes. With the advice of my counsel. I mean if it was for me I wouldn't just volunteer for that. I would have just kept on going but with my assisting counsel at the time that was advised.”
The attorney pressed on, asking Emad why he didn’t want to plead guilty. Emad answered: “Because I felt like it was self-defense defending me and my brother and the video just shows me hitting him on the floor and not knowing the background of the whole situation and threatening.”
Alvin’s attorney continued with his questioning of Emad’s plea, asking him if the judge asked him “a bunch of other questions” similar to this deposition setting. Emad answered that the judge did not ask bunches of questions, and just wanted to hear the story. So Emad told him the story. The guilty plea meant that Emad gave up his right to a trial by jury, and that Emad’s attorney could have cross-examined Alvin, to ask Alvin bunches of questions, but did not because of the guilty plea.
Alvin’s attorney continued on with the implications of the guilty plea questioning:
Alvin's Attorney: "Did he ask you if you were pleading guilty to this misdemeanor assault because you were, indeed, guilty of doing that?"
Emad: "Saying that I applied excessive force and that's the reason why I was guilty."
Alvin's Attorney: "And you agreed to that?"
Emad: "I agreed with it to resolve the case."
Alvin's Attorney: “But did you mean it?”
Emad: "Yes."
Alvin's Attorney: "But you do understand that you could have went forward with the case and had that trial and given the testimony and if you chose to present the self-defense or justification defense to everything that's shown in the video, right, you know you could have done that?"
Emad: "Yes. But I just seen the video and everyone doesn't see it that way." This was the only quote the Highlands Current included in the conclusion of their article. The newspaper then used a quote from Junior Dabashi that Junior changed his mind on and asked them not to include, but according to Junior, the editor Chip Rowe said that the editor insisted on using it.
CHAPTER 5:
The Police Were Allegedly Divided About Their Own Response
Mo was hesitant to go on the record about the police’s response as to how the first incident with Alvin’s alleged verbal abuse was handled, when the Beacon police drove up, Alvin walked by, Emad pointed to him, and the officer did not speak to Alvin.
Even though he was afraid of further abandonment by the police, Mo decided to go on the record with A Little Beacon Blog about this part of the story: “The police were divided over how the first officer handled it,” Mo told ALBB. “The two detectives involved in the case were Brian Lawrence and James Sirrine. We were so cooperative with Brian and showed him all clips needed and he was on our side in the case. Then he turned against us, where James was very helpful and supporting us the whole time. James Sirrine was the one that told us that the police department was divided in the case. Some were saying that the police officer who showed up the first time should have did something and some didn’t care that they thought it was a wrong reaction by my brother and doesn’t want to hear anything else.”
At that time, the Police Chief was Kevin Junjulas. He and Captain Fredericks retired months later in June after the racial reawakening started and organizers marched down Main Street in Beacon all summer. Police Chief Sands Frost stepped in to be the Acting Chief, and after a lengthy process with much considerations given, Chief Frost was selected by Beacon’s Police Chief Search Committee. This was also before the time that Beacon hired a Mental Health Professional, Lashaveous Dicker, to go out on calls with Beacon Police. Chief Frost and longtime Lieutenant Tom Figlia have been working to improve relations with the community ever since.
CHAPTER 6:
Police Take Report From Key Food’s Co-Owner JB Said To Press Charges; It Is Thrown Out; Instead, Emad Is Arrested
The day after the incident, the Key Food Beacon franchise co-owner JB Said went down to the police station to file a Police Report against Alvin Medina, which is filed as CR-00238-20, Blotter No. BL-001734-20. The report states that the detective taking the information about Alvin’s actions, Detective James Sirrine, “completed an arrest warrant for Criminal Tampering 3rd and filed it with the court.”
While JB was not at the store that day, Mo and Emad told him what happened. On their behalf, JB reported: “When [customer] was turned away from the deli he became verbally abusive towards his staff, and began calling them profanities and terrorists. Said states that [customer] then intentionally knocked over several displays of merchandise at the back of the store, causing a large mess inside the store. [Customer] made threats to harm [redacted] and his staff.”
In his deposition, JB told Alvin’s attorney: “He said that --- starting from the incident at the salads he started saying fuck you, mother fuckers, you fucking ‘A-rabs,’ such and such, and he started throwing the middle finger in his face, you know, like when you --- at the clerk in the deli. And Emad told me he's going to fuck you up, you don't know who the fuck we are, fuck you, mother fucking ‘A-rabs.’
JB continued in his testimony for the lawsuit: “He just kept on cursing and cursing over and over. It wasn't the staff cursing. And then I asked --- I made sure to ask Emad did you say anything back and he said I didn't curse back at him or nothing like that, I just told him I don't want his business and that was it, end of conversation. And I don't remember to the T because I wasn't there. I'm just going off what everybody is telling me, what Emad is telling me on that stuff.”
In order to clarify JB’s recollection in his deposition, Alvin’s attorney asked JB if he had watched the video before filing the police report. “The second I understood there was a situation I first thought where they fought was next to the milk, next to the milk is all the way in the back of the store. The video that you showed me is in the front already leaving the aisle, the milk section is all the way in the back. So to my understanding I thought the situation happened there, not in the front. You know, that's why I was thinking the displays or wherever the fight happened was in the back.”
Later, the Police Report that JB filed was withdrawn, or canceled, according to JB. Alvin’s attorney asked JB: “Did there come a time where you withdrew your complaint against Mr. Medina?” The attorney rephrased the question, and asked why Mo did not file the complaint.
JB answered: “Because I thought it was the right thing to do because the situation of what happened. I mean, it's my location, my store. I'm --- most of the managers there is me, I'm always there all the time, so I wanted to do something for the guy that caused us so much problems in the store.”
Alvin’s attorney asked JB if Emad said he felt disrespected. JB recalled: “Not that I know of. He never said the word disrespected, he just said --- he explained it to me as Mr. Medina wasn't--- if he was on some --- that he was drinking or on some kind of drug of some sort. That's what I understood, that he was telling me that the guy was not right at all…On the second encounter he [Emad] was telling me that, that he [Alvin] was definitely on something and it looked like he was coming back just for trouble.”
Alvin’s attorney returned to questioning about the Police Report and JB’s filing of charges. He asked: “Was he [the officer] upset with you when he returned to speak to you?”
JB: “Who, the police officer?”
Alvin’s Attorney: “Yes.”
JB: “No. Why would he be upset with me?”
Alvin’s Attorney: “I was just asking. Did he say anything along the lines of that would be interpreted or construed as questioning your veracity; do you understand what I mean?”
JB: “No, I don't understand. Veracity meaning what exactly?"
Alvin’s Attorney: “I will make it very plain for you. Did he tell you that he thought you were lying or making stuff up the second time he talked to you?"
JB: “The second time I think he talked to me he was explaining to me that he didn't see anything on the camera and I was explaining to him that I was going off what Emad and Moufaq and everybody was explaining to me about the situation and what happened."
Alvin’s Attorney: “And did you stand firm with what you shared with him the first time?"
JB: “Yeah, I explained to him the situation, but he was saying it wasn't credible because the camera system doesn't show that, doesn't show the situation."
Alvin’s Attorney: “So he told you he didn't believe you? Did he say it like that or did he say it the way you just said it ---"
JB: "Yeah, he said it was incredible."
Alvin’ Attorney: "Yeah, well, what did you think of it, what did you think about that?"
JB: “It is what it is. The proof is the proof, you need to see what's in front of you to actually, you know, consider truth."
Alvin’s Attorney: "Did you still believe you were telling the truth?"
JB: Yeah, "I believed I was explaining the situation like it was, but to my understanding, I wasn't a hundred percent accurate with the conversation because I wasn't at the scene, scene of the crime."
Alvin’s Attorney: "Did he tell you after that conversation, that one we're talking about right now, that he was pulling the warrant or withdrawing the criminal charges you wanted to press or something like that?"
JB: "Yes, he was telling me that because he said it wasn't credible enough, there wasn't enough proof to show everything that was going on that we said was going on."
Alvin’s Attorney: "How did that make you feel?"
JB: “I mean, it was okay. It is what it is. I mean, we've got to go with what we see, wheat's in front of us. What can be proven, put it like that. Whatever can be proven is what it should be."
In the Beacon Police Report dated 3/3/2020 22:19 by Wood, Trevor (008), identified as BL - 001734-20 CR-00232-20, police officers did see damaged property. The report stated: “Officers did observe multiple grocery items damaged and on the floor of Keyfoods aisle.” It is not clear why the Detective did not consider this observation made by officers in the earlier Police Report, when he allegedly told JB that damaged displays or groceries were not in the video footage, so did not seem to matter.
CHAPTER 7: A CLOSER LISTEN
Why Being Called “Terrorist” Wasn’t “Heard” In Testimony
After first learning about the incident and later lawsuit in the article in the Highlands Current, this blogger went to Key Food to get a better understanding of what happened. The newspaper article was short, the photo and video only showed the most graphic, heated moments of a much longer story. Both Mo and JB said that the customer had used racial insults that day.
Based on my interview the day after the newspaper article dropped, my first Letter to the Editor to the Highlands Current, I stated that the customer had used Islamaphobic insults. The newspaper’s editor, Chip Rowe, suggested I read the court documents before he published my letter. At my request, Chip emailed the court documents he and his reporter used.
In the court documents, when Mo and Emad were questioned separately by Alvin’s attorney about if Alvin called them “terrorists,” both Mo and Emad answered that he did not. In fact, the customer’s attorney asked Emad several times if Emad felt disrespected. Each time, Emad answered that he did not. Emad expanded: “Why would you feel disrespected if you get into an encounter like that. I didn't think I was disrespected.”
Puzzled, I returned to Key Food Beacon to ask Mo why both he and Emad denied that Alvin called them “terrorists”, if their memories remembered Alvin saying that. It was an uncomfortable question to ask Mo, but he responded quietly: “I don’t hear it anymore. In Oakland, CA, that was chaos.” Mo used to work in bodegas in Oakland before moving to Beacon, NY, as he described to Alvin’s attorney in his deposition. “I know who I am, and I know what they say to me is not true. I am an Imam at the mosque [Masjid Ar Rashid – Islamic Teaching Center] down the street. When I am outside, people yell to me: ‘Go home!’ But I am home.”
Mo continued: “If someone tells me they are going to punch me in the face, I will remember that. That tells me that I should duck; that something might happen to me right now.”
Despite stating that he had shopped at Key Food for several years, Alvin stated and implied several times that he did not know the management at Key Food, who is quite visible both behind and in front of the counter. He referred to them as “the one with the long hair” and other visual indicators. Alvin made it clear in his deposition: “I never paid much attention to the employees there, besides the one with the long hair.”
However, in his Police Report days after the incident to file charges against Emad, Alvin identified him as: “the male employee described as being Middle Eastern with a long beard about 30 years of age.” These were more precise details when Alvin was pursuing Emad’s arrested.
“At first, [Detective] Brian said ‘we are with you guys.’ But when he had us down to the station,” Mo recalled to ALBB, after the police invited Emad down to talk about more details, “he [Detective Brian Lawrence] was a different person.”
CHAPTER 8:
Alvin’s Recollection Of What Police Told Him About Emad
According to JB’s testimony, his Police Report to press charges against Alvin got withdrawn. After Alvin filed a Police Report of his own after he got out of the hospital, the police called Emad to come down to the station to answer a few more questions, JB told ALBB in an interview. When they arrived at the police station, Emad was arrested.
According to Alvin’s own testimony, the police had feelings about who was wrong, and seemed to be basing it on the 20 seconds of the video clip, without questioning others. ALBB has reached out to both detectives for their response to how they handled this, but neither have responded. They forwarded ALBB’s request to Beacon’s City Administrator Chris White, who also did not respond.
Alvin stated in his testimony: "I went to the police station to actually make a report, the police officer that was there -- I went there by myself at nighttime, which was hard enough to even walk over there, but that police officer told me, if I were to make a report, they would have to arrest me then go and get the guy."
At the time, JB’s Police Report was active, and the arrest warrant for Alvin was open.
"First thing the detective said before he started the report he was like, Alvin, I don't care what you went there for, what happened at that supermarket, from what we saw in this video, it wasn't fair what they did to you. When you went to the police station two days after, did you make a report? I didn't even get to report because he said if I filed a report, he would have to arrest me then he'll have to go and arrest the guy."
Alvin's Attorney: “So then, do you know how it came about that two days after that detectives contacted you?”
Alvin: “That's when the detectives just contacted me and then they asked me if I was able to make it to the station.”
Alvin's Attorney: “Did you fill out any paperwork with the police?”
Alvin: “Yes, after the detectives came and picked me up, yes, that's when we made the report.”
Alvin's Attorney: “If you didn't make a report that night, two days after you left the hospital, how did the police know what happened?”
Alvin: “I guess from when they went to the supermarket.”
Alvin's Attorney: “And do you know that they went to the supermarket?”
Alvin: “I'm guessing so.”
ALBB emailed both detectives to verify what Alvin said in his testimony. Leutenant Figlia responded with a reminder that as of 12/23/2021, all of ALBB’s questions for the Police Department need to go through City Administrator Chris White. The City Administrator then did not respond.
Chapter 9:
The Restraining Order
After the incident, JB pursued a restraining order against Alvin Medina. The restraining order was granted in Beacon City Court from Judge Timothy Pagones, who was City Court Judge back then. Alvin needs to walk on the opposite side of the street from Key Food when he passes that property.
The COVID-19 pandemic was declared days after this incident. Over the next two years, this lawsuit traveled through its process. Emad went through his court experience pleading guilty to the charge Alvin filed, and later on, all four people gave their depositions. The two parties settled in mediation, and agreed on March 15, 2022 to end the lawsuit for a payment of $95,000.
According to Alvin’s deposition, all of his medical bills had been paid already prior to the lawsuit settling by his Medicare Insurance 1199 Aetna, with the exception of the Beacon Ambulance Corps bill, which he was still submitting.
After the Stipulation of Discontinuance With Prejudice was signed on March 15, 2022, which stated that the lawsuit wa discontinued because a payment was on the way, Alvin began sharing the 20 second video in his video, accusing Key Food Beacon of being homophobic. Alvin riled up his friends, and didn’t seem to tell them in social media that he had already pursued a lawsuit and was awareded $95,000. Alvin let his friends tell him to sue Key Food Beacon.
Last month, Alvin also called Key Food Beacon “dirty,” which again, is an Arab racial insult, as described above. He continued to verbally assult and abuse Key Food Beacon. Which is what started this whole thing.
The end.
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HUDSON VALLEY FOOD HALL
HUDSON VALLEY FOOD HALL
