On Tuesday (February 16), the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office announced that it dropped the misdemeanor criminal charge against Amy Cooper who called the police on a Black man in Central Park last May.
The office said they made the decision to drop the charge after Cooper completed a racial bias education program and therapy sessions, according to CNN.
“Given the issues at hand and Ms. Cooper’s lack of criminal background, we offered her, consistent with our position on many misdemeanor cases involving a first arrest, an alternative restorative justice resolution; designed not just to punish but to educate and promote community healing,” Assistant District Attorney Joan Illuzzi said in court, according to a statement.
Amy Cooper had been charged with falsely reporting an incident in the third degree stemming from a May 25 incident at Central Park. A Black man, Christian Cooper (no relation), had asked Amy to put a leash on her dog given the area of the park required leashes for animals. In the midst of the argument, Amy called the police, and lied, telling the emergency operator that a Black man was “threatening my life.”
Christian Cooper recorded the incident which went viral on social media. In the aftermath of the incident and national attention, Christian declined to participate in the case against Amy, but the DA’s office pursued the charge given “[t]he simple principle… that one cannot use the police to threaten another and in this case, in a racially offensive and charged manner.”
The incident took place the same day George Floyd was killed by police in Minnesota and further illustrated the very real dangers Black men and Black people face living in America.
The Office said in an earlier statement that one of the goals of the resolutions in this case included “deterring others from perpetuating this racist practice.”
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