Good Samaritan shields woman from gun-wielding driver
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In what has been perceived as a racially motivated incident, a black woman in the United States was held at gunpoint by an unidentified white driver.
Roicia Banks was at a parking lot of a local shopping center in Tempe, Arizona, when an SUV honked at her and almost hit her, ABC-affiliated KNXV reported last Wednesday. The incident happened last Friday, June 19.
John Brewer, who was parked a few spaces away, noticed the turn of events. He got out of his car to check on Banks and to chastise the driver. The SUV driver was described by Banks as a white woman around her 70s.
“I’m yelling at her (the driver), like, trying to get her attention from harassing this young woman who was doing nothing,” Brewer was quoted as saying.
The SUV then sped off, but it eventually came back around.
“I’m yelling ‘you almost hit me. What is wrong with you?'” Banks recalled in the report. “I pointed at my car, and I’m walking toward her at this point.”
The elderly woman then drew a gun. Banks froze and put her hands up in the air. “I’m looking dead in her eyes, and I know she was going to shoot me,” Banks added.
While Banks was frozen on the spot, Brewer jumped directly in front of her and the driver with his hands up as well. Brewer said he felt no fear during that moment.
“Things were crystal clear,” he said in the report. “There was one thing I had to do, and it was [to] step in front of and protect this woman.”
More people were starting to watch the commotion at this point.
“Everybody around her vehicle is telling her, ‘Put the gun away. Put the gun away. Put it down, put it down, put it down,'” Banks recounted. After several seconds of tension, the woman eventually put the gun down and drove off.
“I did not feel it was racially motivated until the escalation of the issue, so quickly…,” Banks said. “I know it was racially motivated because it was de-escalated by a white ally.”
Banks believes that allies, like Brewer, saved her life by doing more than filming what they saw. Tempe Police said that the driver has not yet been located.
Last month, an African-American citizen, George Floyd, was killed while in police custody. Floyd’s case raised weeks long of protests against racism in the U.S. after his death was caught on tape by a bystander. Cha Lino /ra
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