Witness Statement July 7, 2002

On Friday, July 5, 2002 the monthly Sacramento Critical Mass ride took place at about 6 P.M. There was an unusually small turnout (about fifteen people), probably because of the holiday weekend, and there was no police .escort. as there usually is. We had only been riding for about fifteen minutes when a road-rage incident occurred. We were riding down J St. a few blocks from Alhambra (about 25th St.), riding in the left and center lanes and leaving the right lane open for cars to pass, when two or three glass bottles were thrown from a passing car which shattered in the street amidst us, and the throwers of the bottles yelled insults as they sped past us. Then, a couple blocks further up the street, Matt, one of the massers, had stopped on the right side of the street and was standing on the sidewalk filming with his video camera when a young Latino man, I guess about 5 ft. 10 in., 160-170 lbs., probably twenty or younger, with short dark hair, wearing long pants and a T-shirt, came running up the sidewalk from the direction the bottle-throwing car had gone and attacked Matt, throwing punches and then grabbing the video camera and smashing it on the sidewalk. I rode across the street and tried to help Matt, but at that point the assailant turned and walked quickly back in the direction he had come. This happened close to the Carrows Restaurant on J St., and a security guard from the restaurant, who afterwards said his name was Joe Kearney, was also close by and both Joe and I tried to talk to the assailant and get him to stop, but he kept on walking and would not talk to us. The assailant walked a ways and then began to run into the parking lot of the gas station next to the Carrows Restaurant and I followed a ways behind him on my bike. He jumped into a car, I believe the same car as the one the bottles were thrown from, and the car peeled out through the gas station parking lot at high speed, at which point I heard a loud crash. My view of the car and the crash was blocked by a fence, but when I turned the corner I saw that Sand.s bike had been run over by the car, and I yelled for someone to get the license number of the car as it sped away. Someone else shouted back that it was 2YDG349, and I assume that he was correct although I didn.t see the number myself. C.P., another masser with a video camera, was also there, and I believe she filmed the car as it sped away. By this time the other massers had arrived at the gas station, as well as Joe the security guard and several onlookers and people who were gassing up their cars. We were all rather shocked and didn.t know what to do next but Joe called the police on his radio and they arrived in a couple of minutes. After at least three police cars had arrived, officers T. Cooke # 725, P.R. O.Malley # 649, and Sergeant R. Huff #108, questioned us extensively about what had happened. We described the events to them and beseeched them to follow after the hit-and-run vehicle, but they would not. I remember T. Cooke being particularly uncooperative, saying that it wasn.t his responsibility because we .instigated. the incident, and acted unfamiliar with Critical Mass, although I find it hard to believe that any Sacramento Police officers haven.t at least heard of Critical Mass after the problems of the last year. Sand was especially upset, understandably so, and told the officers that they were going to be in .big trouble. if they didn.t do something quick, and that the hit and run vehicle .could have killed somebody. but the officers showed no inclination to try and apprehend the assailants, even after we had told them the license number. C.P. then tried to rewind her video tape to show them proof of the license number, but she apparently didn.t know how to work the camera correctly and could not find the footage of the incident at that time. Sand gave them his information in order to press charges and the officers questioned several of the massers, as well as Joe the security guard and another witness, who said her name was Jean Patterson. Both Sergeant R. Huff and P.R. O.Malley went to great pains to try and convince us to turn over the video tapes to them, saying that the evidence would not be admissible in court if we did not, but we would not hand over the tapes. I also convinced C.P. to film a witness statement from Joe the security guard at this time. All of this took about an hour, and the officers still had taken no action to pursue the hit-and-run car, when we finally left the gas station at about 7:30 to continue the ride, and Sand went to the Police station with the officers to press charges. There were no further incidents that day, although T. Cooke followed us in his car until the ride ended at the Amtrak station before 8:00.

Signed, Evan Parsons Payne