The liberal Democratic mayor of Columbus, Ohio allegedly gave explicit instructions for the police to stand down in the face of violent protesters. Drivers kept calling 911 as they were surrounded by the protesters, with some even laying across the hoods of the cars.
One such conversation with a 911 dispatcher is one from a driver who called 911 and told the dispatcher that protesters on motorcycles were popping wheelies and it was getting dangerous:
The 911 dispatcher who took the aforementioned man’s call was heard on audio saying that Democratic Mayor Andrew Ginther gave authorities some pretty explicit instructions about protesters, WSYX reported.
“We were told by our mayor to stand down, so the mayor has given them full reins of the street,” the dispatcher said, according to the station.
The caller replied, “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Nope,” the dispatcher was heard answering, “we were told to stand down.”
Columbus police posted on their Facebook page that it is fake news and they were not told to stand down but gave no reason for failing to respond to the threats:
“CPD officers have not been asked to ‘stand-down’ to protesters. No direction that Mayor Ginther has given to Chief [Thomas] Quinlan over the last three days would have prevented police officers from intervening in a situation where a car or a person within it were being attacked. If people or property are threatened, there are many tactics at the disposal of police to address the situation. However, the incident described does not sound like one in which tear gas would have been considered appropriate before this week’s direction.”
The mayor’s office also denied the charges.
Keith Ferrell of the FOP told the station:
“From what I’m hearing from our brass and our rank and file, there is a lot of confusion and not very good direction being given on how to handle those situations. And I just think the public and the officers deserve to know how we’re gonna handle these things.”
