| Forever The Sickest Kids, We The Kings and Mercy Mercedes VS. Philadelphia Police |
| Written by Sarah Mudgway |
| Tuesday, 28 April 2009 22:13 |
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Picture this. It’s late at night, on a spring evening in Philadelphia. Bands had finished performing at a local venue, kids were happy and on their way home and the crew are busy at work loading up vans with the bands equipment. Along come the Philadelphia police. They request for the vans to be moved… the crew explain they still have equipment to finish packing. Suddenly, all hell breaks loose. Blood, beatings, blatant bullying, cops asking “do you want to die tonight?”… and all over parking. Unfortunately this isn’t a scene from a film, or a repeat of ‘Cops’ on C4. This is real. On Sunday the 26th of April (U.S. time) Philadelphia police waged what is being described as an unfair and unjust battle against both members and crew of Forever The Sickest Kids, Mercy Mercedes and We The Kings, leaving some hospitalized and others arrested.  "Chris V's head left this on the floor after cops beat him for nothing." While the story is somewhat hazy and fairly one sided, all reports from various bands and sources all seem to tell a similar story. Members of the Mercy Mercedes crew were busy loading up their van with equipment from that night. They were parked outside the back of the venue, in a place they were instructed to park. Due to a curfew enforced in the city of Philadelphia, police were patrolling the area to make sure the younger kids were on their way home. Some of the police had told the crew packing equipment to move their van, despite the fact that more equipment was needed to be packed away. It’s at this point the story becomes a little unclear. According to various Twitter posts and blogs, the police started becoming angry, unreasonable and violent towards some members. Chris, a merch guy for We The Kings allegedly came outside to see what the misunderstanding was about, only to be chased inside, thrown to the ground cutting his head on a glass bottle, and being beat by steel rods despite him being badly injured and compliant. While this was occurring inside, members of the crew and bands were being arrested and verbally abused by angered police officers, supposedly being punched, kicked and hit while being asked “do you want to die tonight?” by the Philadelphia police. Girls standing by and filming the events, had flashlights aimed at their camera to prevent footage being usable, and were all confronted by the police to stop filming and move along. How the night ended, is at this stage fairly unknown. According to a blog post by Brendan from Valencia, a couple of crew members were pushed into police cars and taken to the police station, while Chris from the We The Kings crew was hospitalized for loss of blood and a cut to his head. Whether any of those involved were formally arrested, and how Chris is doing, is yet to be determined. All those who were involved seem to be fairly quiet today, and I’m sure once emotions are calmed down and more details come to light, we will receive an official story. From all accounts, it appears to be an act of overly aggressive and unnecessary violence. For members of the public who are employed to maintain the safety of the citizens of their city, it seems perhaps a little over-the-top and redundant to waste such energy on some young guys loading equipment into a van. Sure, the members of the crew perhaps should have just moved the vans and then come back once the anger had cooled down. Arguing with already angry police is probably not the smartest move, even if the police were at fault. However, under no circumstances, especially when no threats had been made and no one was in physical danger, is continued violence acceptable, authority figure or otherwise. For the bands and crew who were involved, particularly to those injured, I hope that justice takes place in one way or another. I also hope, for the sake of the kids who look up to members of these bands, that as details increase and more stories emerge that the crew really were the innocent parties to this awful and barbaric crime. In the end however, violence is not the answer. For first hand accounts of the events, more information can be found at the following links. |
