By Dennis O’Neil

DeMarcus Topp was enjoying some dinner with friends on the bottom floor of the Student Activities Center last Wednesday. The next thing he knew, he was a suspect in a robbery investigation.
A Wendy’s employee thought she recognized Topp as one of the assailants from the Wendy’s robbery a week earlier who were identified as black. The employee called the Department of Public Safety who, after arriving on the scene, approached Topp and asked for his ID while questioning the employee.
According to a statement issued by student leadership taken from eye witness reports and Topp himself, it was determined by the officers that Topp did not fit the suspect profile since they believed the suspect to not be a U of L student. When Topp and his party tried to leave, one of the officers placed a forearm in his chest and requested that he remain seated.
Topp said that his frustration mounted when he was unable to obtain any further information from the officers after this point. His questions went unanswered by the officers detaining him who treated the incident as occasion for humor. After all ID’s had been returned, the officers left the SAC without any further explanation of the situation.
This incident has sparked a storm of controversy from many U of L students who feel that the treatment of the situation was racially motivated.
“There is no safe space for African-American males anywhere,”  said senior political science major Rosie Washington. “If the university can’t guarantee a safe space for all students, then what exactly are they here for?”
Pan-African studies major Dre Dawson said  he has had problems with DPS along the same lines.
“It has happened with me a number of times with the same police,” Dawson said. “I personally related to Demarcus’s frustration as a student leader and especially as a black male.”
According to Michael Anthony, interim director of the Cultural Center, the situation is at a standstill until Topp decides what course of action he wants to pursue. He said that there was a meeting this past Friday between Topp and DPS leaders which he said was beneficial to both parties.
Student Government Association President Rudy Spencer said that if Topp’s allegations are true, he doesn’t think the officers should be on U of L’s campus.
“Because our university is so diverse, tolerance is a big asset of that,” Spencer said. “That extends all the way down to the guy who is emptying the trash.”
According to DPS Chief Wayne Hall, because this was not a criminal incident, there was no report filed on it internally. Hall said that he had seen the statement issued by student leadership about the incident and though he did not point out any specific inaccuracies, he said some of the officers’ behavior may have been misinterpreted.
Hall also said that the officers followed DPS policy and were actually not as forceful with Topp as they could have been. In response to an incident where DPS has reason to believe a suspect could be armed, Hall said they have the right to handcuff and frisk a suspect. In this situation, the officers chose not to.
“They conducted the investigation as low key as they possibly could have under the circumstances,” Hall said. “Considering where they were I think they handled it with minimal interruption.”
Anthony said he feels that DPS did not communicate appropriately with Topp in the situation. Once it was established that he was not the assailant, Anthony said that Topp could not leave because the officers were still questioning the Wendy’s employee. The officers chose not to communicate this with him.
Hall said that DPS will be holding meetings with the administration to determine how to better educate students about DPS procedures.
For many students though, the racial element of the case remains a heavy factor. Part of the problem for some are the campus crime alerts, which they feel only update students on things like race and gender and nothing more distinguishing.
“When you have all of these crime alerts that mention black males, you come on campus and immediately females start crossing the street,” said Demetrius Gray, president of the Association of Black Students. “I am in no way a criminal, but I wind up paying for other people’s crimes.”
-Tytianna Wells contributed to this story.