A sheriff’s office in New York defended two deputies who detained and handcuffed an 11-year-old girl this week, saying she matched the description of a suspect. The Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office, responding to criticism after a video of the encounter was posted online, called the deputies’ actions “reasonable” but said it would change its policy to notify a parent or guardian of any child who is detained for criminal investigative purposes, which it did not do in this instance.
The deputies handcuffed the 11-year-old, who has not been publicly identified, for seven minutes Monday afternoon in Syracuse, according to a timeline of her detainment released by the sheriff’s office, which said she was dressed similarly to a person who was wanted in connection with the theft of a car. The girl was detained a few blocks from where the stolen car was initially observed, the sheriff’s office said.
The wanted person, who, like the girl, is Black, has not been identified or captured. The dashcam of a deputy’s patrol vehicle recorded her as she was fleeing from the stolen vehicle, the sheriff’s office said.
A woman who identified herself on Facebook as the 11-year-old’s mother and shared videos of the girl’s interaction with the deputies could not immediately be reached for comment. Her Facebook post had been shared nearly 6,000 times as of early Thursday afternoon and garnered more than 130 comments, the vast majority of them criticizing the sheriff’s office for having handcuffed the girl and not having notified her parents that she had been detained.
The person police in Syracuse were looking for is in a still from a patrol vehicle’s dashcam. The person’s face was obscured by the sheriff’s office.
Sheriff’s deputies detain an 11-year-old girl who they believed matched the person’s description.
In the video, the girl stands with two deputies on a snow-filled sidewalk with her hands cuffed behind her back. One of the deputies tells the children who were with her that they can keep going, but one of them responds that she has to stay with the girl because they’re related.
“We can’t just leave her,” one of the children says.
One of the children tells the deputies that they were coming from school. The female deputy tells the handcuffed girl that someone wearing “the exact same thing you’re wearing just stole a car,” prompting one of the children to respond: “We can’t drive.”
The female deputy tells her: “What do you mean? Most kids can’t drive, and they’re still out here stealing cars.”
The children tell the deputies they had been playing in the snow on their way home from school.
The deputies tell the children that the wanted person was wearing an outfit similar to the 11-year-old girl’s — a pink jacket and camouflage pants.
“The exact same description,” the male deputy says.
The female deputy tells the children that she’s waiting to be sent a picture of the person and that if it isn’t the girl they detained,