Erie residents voiced their concerns for over an hour at a City Council meeting Wednesday, bringing attention to a weekend arrest now under investigation by the Erie Police Department.
The investigation follows the circulation of a social media video that appears to show a City of Erie police cruiser colliding with 41-year-old Keven Sparks during an arrest, followed by officers hitting him multiple times.
According to court documents, Sparks was wanted for theft and trespassing and had outstanding warrants in Erie and Venango counties. The video has been widely shared since the incident occurred on Sunday.
The officer involved in the arrest is currently working and has been notified of the investigation. This officer has five days to provide a response.
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Jerry Roberts, an Erie resident, described his reaction to the video. “What I saw is totally unnecessary; what I saw was attempted murder; what I saw is aggravated attempted assault. Had that been me or anyone behind me, we would have been arrested immediately,” Roberts said.
Malcolm Pullium, another Erie resident, questioned the appropriateness of the force used. “Those warrants has to be petty; they can’t warrant that type of arrest. What if he died? What was the excuse going to be for this one?” Pullium said.
Mayor Daria Devlin of the City of Erie stated her strong reaction upon seeing the footage. “When I saw the video for the first time on Sunday, it took my breath away,” Devlin said. She also acknowledged the community’s engagement, stating, “We’ve heard from the community loud and clear today. We expected that, we want that, we want to hear from them.”
Bishop John Crosby, Sparks’ uncle, shared his nephew’s account of the arrest from prison. “He called me from the prison. And he just told me that ‘I didn’t do anything.’ He said, ‘I’m just laying there and they tased me while I was on the ground, they beat me.’ To me, none of it was necessary,” Crosby said.
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Bishop Crosby expressed skepticism about the potential outcome of the investigation, anticipating the officer would be cleared. “They’re going to say he had every right to do what he did and they’re going to let him go,” Crosby stated. He added that, in his view, the system has historically been prejudiced. “It’s always been prejudiced, it’s always been against blacks, it is never treated blacks the same,” Crosby said.
Investigators have collected all available video evidence and gathered witness statements as part of the ongoing review. Mayor Devlin is advocating for the city to revive a practice similar to a previous board that aimed to build trust between the community and law enforcement.
“If it’s what we had before and it just needs to be tweaked, let’s do that. We need to have something in place so when incidents like this happen we have a mechanism for review and also recommendations for moving forward,” Mayor Devlin said, emphasizing the need for an established process.
The officer under investigation has five days to respond to the inquiry. Mayor Devlin is pushing for an update on the investigation by the middle of next week.
All facts in this report were gathered by journalists employed by WJET/WFXP. Artificial intelligence tools were used to reformat information into a news article for our website. This report was edited and fact-checked by WJET/WFXP staff before being published.