Video After The Jump
The Manhattan district attorney’s office is investigating an ugly confrontation inside a Soho hotel where a woman falsely accused a Black teenager of stealing her iPhone and lunged at him, the DA’s office told Intelligencer on Monday. The NYPD is investigating a complaint of harassment, according to a spokesperson.
On Saturday, jazz musician Keyon Harrold and his 14-year-old son were staying at the Arlo hotel when they were confronted by an unidentified woman in the lobby. Harrold started recording video of the incident that showed the woman screaming at Harrold’s son, accusing him of stealing her phone, and asking a man who identified himself as a hotel manager to take the phone from the teenager. “Take the case off that’s mine. Literally get it back,” she tells the manager. Harrold responded as they moved through the lobby, “You think there’s only one iPhone made in the world?” The woman followed, then allegedly tackled Harrold’s son.
Harrold’s video went viral over the weekend, racking up over 1.8 million views on Instagram alone. Harrold’s attorney, Ben Crump, said the family wants the woman charged with assault and battery.
Harrold told the New York Times he believes he and his son, who are both Black, were racially profiled by the woman. The hotel told the Times it had called police during the incident. Harrold said on Instagram that the hotel told him the woman’s missing phone was dropped off by an Uber driver soon after the confrontation.
Harrold, 40, is a jazz trumpeter who has performed with Common, Jay Z, Beyoncé, and Rihanna, and won a Grammy Award for music he performed in a 2015 Miles Davis biopic starring Don Cheadle.
On Tuesday, Keyon Harrold Jr. and his parents spoke to Good Morning America, where the teen said he initially was “confused because I’ve never seen that lady ever and I didn’t know what to do at the moment.”
Source: Intelligencer
EXCLUSIVE: Keyon Harrold Jr. says he’s still “shell-shocked” from the confrontation with a white woman who wrongly accused the teen of stealing her phone: “I think I was a threat to her.”
— Good Morning America (@GMA) December 29, 2020
His family and lawyer Ben Crump are now searching for justice. https://t.co/i9rZzYvW4s pic.twitter.com/D7L0Lu8Wm2
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