Police Called on Black University Employee For Walking To Work, Described As “Very Agitated”

On Friday, a 14-year employee of the University of Massachusetts Amherst was reduced to an “agitated black male,” warranting police presence. 

In an interview with The Daily Hampshire Gazette, #ReginaldAndrade said he was walking to his job in the disability office, following his routine morning workout, when he was met by officials for questioning. 

According to the publication, an unidentified person phoned the school’s tip line at 7:45 a.m. to report a “very agitated” African-American man walking into the Whitmore Administration Building with a “large duffel bag…hanging off a strap, very heavy hanging on the ground.” 

Andrade fit the description. 

Soon after, the employee was met by two plainclothed officers, who questioned him about his whereabouts the night before and when he got to campus. According to Andrade, the officers also asked him if he was upset as he walked into the building. 

But, for him, the entire ordeal was racial profiling at its core.

“How can somebody just walk by me, not even speaking, and try to discern that I was agitated?” Andrade said. “This is when it becomes dangerous, when people know how to push the buttons of law enforcement…Those were those strong key buzzwords: agitated black man dragging a heavy bag.” 

Since then though, the university Chancellor has opened up about the entire incident in an email to the campus community, saying, “this is a difficult matter.” 

“We are living at the intersection of two very trying issues,” Kumble Subbaswamy wrote. “We must all do our part to respond quickly to perceived threats of potential violence on campus, and we must build an inclusive community that respects everyone and rejects profiling.”