9-year-old mocks cops and gets arrested. Minutes later, he regretted it a lot. What started as a slow day turned into an intense one when Officer Jake arrested a young Black girl named Vina. But who knew that just 12 minutes later, he would come to regret that decision?
On that fateful day, Jake was patrolling the roads, driving attentively, and scanning for any shady characters who might disrupt the community’s peace. The streets were mostly empty as the kids were in school, and most adults were at work. He only encountered a lone car every few minutes, making it feel as if he were the only one on the road. However, as he turned a corner, Jake saw two people walking down the side of the road—a teenage boy, no older than 18, holding the hand of a little girl around 9 years old. They walked hand in hand, laughing as the girl jumped up and down.
Upon seeing them, Jake’s interest was piqued. He found their presence suspicious, as the younger girl should have been in school, and the teenager either at work or school. Convinced they were up to no good, Jake resolved to get to the bottom of it.
Jake pressed the pedal of the patrol vehicle and quickly caught up with them, pulling over beside the duo. He stepped out of the vehicle with a frown and walked around to face them. He demanded to know where they were coming from and where they were going. The teenager stepped forward, introducing himself as Luke, and his 9-year-old sister, V. Luke explained that they were simply on their way home and meant no trouble.
“You look like trouble. You also look and sound like a liar,” Jake replied. The officer claimed that Vina should be at school, not on her way home. He insisted that Luke was only lying so they wouldn’t get punished.
At that point, Vina spoke up. She told Jake that her brother wasn’t lying because they were coming from a hospital. She had been sick for a while and was only just returning home. She turned and pointed at the house not far away. “That’s our house,” she said innocently.
Jake looked at her as if she’d suddenly grown horns. The hospital was 15 minutes away on foot, and he knew that a sick person would never have tried to walk the entire journey on foot. He was sure then that she was lying, and was only doing so to protect her brother. If Luke needed protection, then it meant that he was involved in something shady that he didn’t want Jake to find out about.
Jake looked at the two of them and asked why they were together. Surprised, Luke replied that they were siblings and Vina was his younger sister. But Jake wasn’t listening. He was so sure that they were up to no good, and he was going to do everything in his power to figure out what they were hiding.
Jake called Luke a drug dealer and talked about how “his people” love to do those sorts of things. He searched Luke for drugs or weapons. When he found nothing, he shook his shoulder, screaming, “Where is it? Where are you hiding it?”
At that moment, Jake’s temper flared. His frustration with not finding anything on Luke boiled over. He grabbed Luke by the collar and slammed him against the side of the patrol car, making Vina scream in terror. Jake sneered down at Luke, tightening his grip, his eyes wild with anger.
“Do you actually think you can outdo me?” Jake questioned, with much anger and disdain evident in his tone of voice. “I know your kind, always hiding something. If I have to tear this whole neighborhood apart, I’ll find what you’re stashing.”
Vina, her small frame trembling, tried to intervene, pulling at Jake’s arm with all her might. “Please leave him alone,” she cried, tears streaming down her face. But Jake’s grip only tightened, and he shoved Luke harder against the car, causing him to wince in pain. Luke choked, his eyes full of terror, yet he was able to utter the words, “We are not trying to cover anything up. You are just a cop who is being aggressive.”
Jake’s rage hit a new peak. He yanked Luke away from the car and threw him to the ground. “You’ve just made the biggest mistake of your life, punk,” he snarled. In that instant, Jake’s true nature was laid bare. He was no longer just a cop on a power trip, but a man who took pleasure in exerting control over those who couldn’t fight back.
Vina, now full of fear but unyielding to her captor, looked at Jake with puffy eyes from crying. “You will up this country. I promise you, somebody will see what you are doing, and you will be the one in trouble.”
But Jake only laughed, a harsh, bitter sound. “You think anyone cares about a couple of kids like you? You’re nothing but a nuisance.”
Luke couldn’t believe what he was experiencing. He swore that he was none of those things Jake called him. In response, Jake pushed him to the ground and ordered him to shut up. When Luke tried to get back to his feet, Jake shoved him down again.
Next thing he knew, Jake began to pull out his handcuffs, ready to arrest Luke. “Nobody harasses a cop and goes free. No one,” Jake yelled. Luke was shocked. He was the one getting harassed! When he tried to resist, Jake became rough with him, using his body to press him harder against the patrol car. Luke kept claiming that he was innocent and continued saying that Jake had no right at all to arrest him. The officer simply told him that he was going to make sure he went away for a long time.
Luke was about to lose it because Jake was about to shove him into the patrol car. He was sick of being treated unfairly and falsely accused of things he had not done. Luke mustered all his courage and kicked the patrol car door with an unexpected amount of force. Jake was taken aback when the door banged back into his side, giving him a sharp pain in his ribs.
“How in the hell…?” With a yell, Jake staggered a little. Luke took the risk and ran away, adrenaline propelling him forward at a rapid pace. His heart raced in his chest as he ran for the closest alley. Even when Vina begged him to stop, he was unable to. He wasn’t going to let some corrupt cop throw him in a cell for something he didn’t do.
Furious now, Jake recovered swiftly. He yelled, “Get back here, you little punk!” and grabbed his radio to summon help—that is, until something darker seized him. He made the decision to take care of things on his own and didn’t seek assistance. He grinned like a predator and dashed after Luke, reaching automatically for his baton.
Luke, feeling Jake gaining on him, darted around a corner, his lungs burning. But the alley he turned into was a dead end. Trapped, he turned to face the approaching officer, who now had his baton out, eyes blazing with fury. “You think you can run from me?” Jake growled, advancing on Luke like a hunter closing in on its prey. “I’ll teach you to mess with me.”
Luke’s back was against the wall, literally and figuratively. As Jake raised the baton, Luke knew he had no choice but to fight back. Desperation gave him strength. He grabbed a nearby trash can lid, using it as a makeshift shield, and braced himself for the impact.
Jake swung the baton with all his might, but Luke blocked it with the lid, the force of the blow reverberating through his arms. Jake’s face twisted with anger at the defiance, and he swung again, harder this time, determined to break through Luke’s defense. But Luke wasn’t giving up. With a surge of energy, he pushed the lid forward, slamming it into Jake’s chest, knocking him back a few steps. The move surprised Jake, but it also fueled his rage even more.
“Enough!” Jake roared, charging at Luke, knocking the lid from his hands and sending it clattering to the ground. He grabbed Luke by the collar, lifting him slightly off the ground, and slammed him against the wall. Luke gasped for air as the impact drove the wind out of him. Jake’s face was inches from his, the officer’s breath hot and stinking of fury.
“You think you’re tough, huh?” Jake hissed, his grip tightening. “You’re nothing. You hear me? Nothing.”
Luke’s vision blurred from the pressure on his neck, but he refused to look away. He glared at Jake, every ounce of defiance he had left burning in his eyes.
Then, just as Jake raised his baton for another strike, a loud, piercing voice echoed down the alley:
“Stop! Get away from him!”
Jake froze, turning his head to see Vina standing at the entrance of the alley, holding up her phone, recording everything. “Let him go, or I swear this video is going viral.”
Before the teenager could say anything else, he was shoved into the car, and the door was slammed shut. Vina stood by the side of the road, staring in shock as her brother got arrested like a common criminal. Tears burned in her eyes as she tried to rush to him, but Jake roughly dragged her away from the car and yelled at her to stay away.
The officer was about to get back into his car when V grabbed him by the hand. She cried and begged him to let her brother go. She insisted that they were truly going home from the hospital and that Luke had done nothing wrong at all.Instead, the officer told her to go back to school and stop hanging out with people like Luke, or she would be the next person he arrested. Vina, frustrated and filled with rage, couldn’t just stand by and watch her brother being hauled away like a criminal. Suddenly, she got up and, risking everything, decided to push Jake as hard as she could in the chest.
Jake was taken off guard by the move and stepped back for a moment.
“You think you can touch my brother?” Vina screamed, her voice shaking but fierce. She balled her fists, ready to strike again if she had to.
Jake, infuriated by the audacity of this young girl, grabbed her by the arm, squeezing hard enough to make her wince. “You must be out of your mind if you really think you can fight me too, you little girl,” Jake sneered, his grip tightening. He yanked her closer, his face twisted with anger as he loomed over her.
Vina’s heart pounded in her chest, but she refused to back down. When she saw her brother in the back of the car, looking scared with fear etched on his face, her defiance only grew. In an impulsive act of bravery, she turned her head and spat on Jake’s badge. The spit landed directly on the badge, a symbol of all the authority Jake wielded with cruelty.
Outraged, Jake physically assaulted her, pushing her down onto the pavement.
“You just made the biggest mistake of your life!” Jake snarled, reaching for his baton again.
Vina stood, motionless, as she watched him walk toward the driver’s seat of the patrol car. He had his back turned to her, so she didn’t see the smug smile spread across his face as he fished out his car keys and got behind the wheel. But as far as Vina was concerned, her belief that cops were kind and just had been shattered. Now, as she stood watching Jake in the patrol car, she was convinced that he was worse than any monster she’d ever seen in those horror movies.
Jake had always wanted to be a police officer, raised in a family of cops. He was the fourth generation to wear the badge, and it was an honor for both him and his family. However, Jake had taken his heritage to an extreme, harboring a belief in white superiority and considering himself above the law. His bias was evident in his track record and in the way he handled arrests, especially when it came to Black individuals.
One night, Jake had seen a Black man, a lone pedestrian, walking through a residential area. With no reason at all, Jake had stepped it up, sliding his black-and-white patrol car in front of the man’s path. The man had stopped in his tracks, perplexed and more than a little cautious. But rather than attempting to understand what was going on, Jake had jumped out of the car before the man could speak and had grabbed him by the collar, slamming him against the car bonnet.
“What are you doing out here, punk?” Jake had growled, his face inches from the man’s.
The man had tried to explain that he was just walking home from a late shift, but Jake hadn’t listened. He’d shoved him harder against the car, twisting his arm behind his back until the man cried out in pain.
“So, you were just strolling here, trying to cause havoc, huh?” Jake had yelled as he whipped out his baton. He’d slammed it down on the man’s legs, causing him to collapse with a shriek. But Jake hadn’t stopped there. He’d piled blow after blow onto the man’s ribs, each one accompanied by a vulgar insult. “You think you’re better than me? I know your kind, always looking for trouble.”
He’d cuffed the man, yanking him to his feet with brutal force. Blood dripped from a gash on the man’s forehead where his head had hit the hood, but Jake hadn’t cared. He’d dragged the man to the back of his patrol car and shoved him inside, slamming the door with a vicious smirk.
Back at the station, Jake had written a report filled with lies, claiming the man had resisted arrest, was carrying a weapon, and had been acting suspiciously. He knew no one would question his word over that of a Black man. It had been just another night for Jake—another life ruined without a second thought.
This was evident in Jake’s pattern of behavior. He sought out situations where he could justify his prejudices, and if he couldn’t find any proof, he’d invent charges. Anyone who didn’t comply with him as easily as he wanted faced the consequences of his violence. His brutality was particularly severe with Black individuals. He often fabricated claims of assault, asserting he was forced to defend himself. With no evidence to disprove his word, he avoided accountability.
Jake was careful to ensure his victims never recorded him, allowing him to make false claims and punish them further. Nothing thrilled Jake more than putting handcuffs on young Black men—it was the highlight of his day. Unsurprisingly, Jake’s attitude was quite the opposite when it came to white individuals. He took their side and did whatever he could to exonerate them from accusations. In some cases, he even destroyed evidence if it implicated someone he knew.
Jake’s corruption was deeply intertwined with his racism. As the years progressed, claims of physical violence and misconduct began to emerge, raising concerns. His fellow officers knew about his fraudulent behavior, and many detested him, but Jake paid no attention. His family’s close ties to the police force gave him immunity, and no one dared to challenge him. His arrogance grew, and he believed himself untouchable.
That morning, Luke had simply become another name on Jake’s long list of unlawful arrests. As Jake got into his car, Vina rushed to his window, begging once again for him to release her brother. Jake ignored her and rolled up the window. Vina had to pull her hand away quickly to avoid getting hurt.
Realizing that Jake was about to drive off without listening to her, Vina knew she had to do something drastic. As he started the engine, she began knocking on the car window, wrapping her tiny knuckles against it persistently until Jake was forced to open the door and bark at her to leave him alone. She staggered backward, terrified by his outburst, but just as he went to shut the door again, she leaped forward and grabbed the door, determined to stop him.
Jake, infuriated by her persistence, let the car door slam toward her, causing her to fall to the ground. “Stay out of my way, or you’ll regret it, you little brat!” he shouted. He slammed the door shut again and was about to drive off when Vina ran back to the window and began knocking on it once more.
Jake considered driving off anyway, but the potential consequences of hitting her were too much of a risk. Instead, he decided to deal with her another way. He rolled down the window and barked harshly at her again. Vina hesitated but eventually ran off, calling him an “ugly, crazy cop” under her breath.
Jake slammed the window shut, frustrated. However, the second he did, Vina ran back. This time, she positioned herself in front of the car and began banging her tiny fists on the bonnet, daring him to come out. She called him a lazy cop who loved to arrest innocent boys and laughed, mocking his ability to do his job.
She made faces at him and dared him to step out of the car, taunting him by saying she was just a little Black girl and there was nothing he could do to her. Unfortunately for Vina, that last statement was the final straw for Jake.
Furious, he threw open the car door and stormed out. But as soon as the door opened, Vina took off, running in the opposite direction. Jake, seeing her sprint away, gave chase, knowing he could easily catch her. Vina quickly crawled under a flower bed and into a nearby yard. By the time Jake reached the flower bed, she was already sprinting toward her house.
Jake increased his pace and reached her just as she was about to slam the door shut. Panting heavily, Jake was fuming. She had made him run for nothing, and he would make her pay. He pulled out a second set of cuffs and, right there in the house, cuffed her tiny wrists behind her back. He then led her out, ignoring the angry protests of her neighbors, who demanded to know why he was arresting a 9-year-old.
Vina struggled, refusing to allow him to take her easily. Jake opted to drag her to the patrol car, telling her she’d be joining her brother and learning the consequences of mocking an officer. Just as he was shoving her into the car beside her brother, a loud cry of “No!” rang out.
Jake turned to see a young woman charging toward them, fiercely holding up a phone that was recording everything.
“I won’t let you arrest them. They’re innocent!” she declared.
When Jake demanded to know who she was, she introduced herself as Bella, a human rights activist.
