Black band director speaks out after violent arrest at Alabama football game

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• Amna Nawaz:

  Fallout from the Tasing and arrest of an Alabama high school band director is sending ripples across the nation.

  Video of the incident after a Thursday night football game in Birmingham shows a chaotic scene. We're going to play some of that video now, and we should warn you that it may be disturbing to some viewers.

  In that video, police approach Minor High School's band director, Johnny Mims, who is leading his students as they performed into the so-called fifth quarter, a tradition from historically Black colleges in which both teams' bands play dueling songs after the game ends.

• Man:

  Call your band! Tell them to stop!

• Woman:

  Cut it! We got to go! The minutes is over.

• Johnny Mims, Minor High School Band Director:

  I know. We're fixing to go. This is our last song.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Officials can be heard asking Mims to stop playing, as he tells them they're on the last song. The stadium lights then go dark. And

• Woman:

  Let's go!

• Amna Nawaz:

  And the situation escalates when Mims steps off the platform and officers begin trying to handcuff him. A physical altercation starts between the officers and Mims.

• Man:

  He's going to jail. He hit the officer. He's got to go to jail.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Mims objects to being arrested and is then repeatedly Tased by police.

  Joining us now is Johnny Mims and his lawyer, Juandalynn Givan, who's also an Alabama state representative.

  Welcome to both of you. Thanks for joining us.

  And, Mr. Mims, I want to begin with you, because I'm interested in your perspective in that moment. We just saw on the video multiple officers are asking you to stop playing. You're telling them it's your last song. They say, we're going to call the superintendent. You say, get out of my face.

  It just seems to escalate and escalate and escalate. And I'm just wondering what you're thinking in that moment. Did you consider, I should stop playing?

• Johnny Mims:

  In the footage you see, I'm directly in front of the band. So I'm pretty much trying to give guidance to the band. It's very difficult to give that if you have persons in front of you. So I know it seems as if it was as simple as just cutting the band off.

  I have also been kind of making it clear to everybody there's a group of band in front of me. So I have 145 students total. Of that group, it is split. So I have a half — a majority of the group in the stands. And then I have another portion of the group on the floor. So there's a certain coordination that has to happen before the band to be able to stop.

  And that's pretty much what you hear. So, you hear — you see an officer reaching over, over the fence, telling me I need to stop playing or we need to leave. And so you will hear me gesture to that — to that officer, please get out my face, in a way to make sure he's able to move out the way so that I can give proper instructions to the students, because they were obstructing my opportunity to do that.

  And so that was my mind-set. Again, I'm responsible for making sure that I'm able to properly coordinate everything with the group. And, again, I had the group, because we're such a larger group, that group was split over two different sections.

• Amna Nawaz:

  And we see also on the video officers start to then say, "You're going to go to jail." You give a thumbs up and say, that's cool. Did you expect them to try to arrest you afterwards?

• Johnny Mims:

  And that thumbs up was — really was my way of just trying to go ahead and let them know we're trying to wrap it up, in a sense of, I hadn't done anything.

  If you look really on my face, more importantly, I was just pretty much mostly knowing that I hadn't done anything. So, in my head, I'm like, there is no reason why they would take me to jail when I haven't done anything. I'm pretty much doing exactly what my job requires me to do, which is direct the band.

  And so that's the gesture you got back from me. And, again, it's very difficult to see that from the bodycam, but on the other side of that cam is that the officer making gestures and threatening gestures at me while this process is happening. And, unfortunately, you can't see that.

  But that is the reason why you see me saying, OK, OK, that's cool, because I'm trying to find a quick way to go ahead and get them out of the way, so that I can go ahead and get the band to finish up the last tune that we were doing, which was really only 10 or 15 or maybe 30 seconds from being completed.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Ms. Givan, we have all seen the video. Your client was Tased multiple times after that. He's now been charged with disorderly conduct, harassment, and resisting arrest.

  You're calling for all the charges to be dropped and for the police who Tased Mr. Mims to be suspended. What has the response been like so far from the police department?

• Rep. Juandalynn Givan (D-AL):

  Oh, wow.

  The response from the police department, of course, was their initial response. Of course, they own no fault in what happened to my client. However, they have not been able to produce not one showing a bodycam. And I'm glad you mentioned the body camera.

  What you all — and I started sending out to the general public — excuse me — to the press yesterday, I actually on Tuesday received the various pieces of footage in different angles of the bodycam. And what you all received or what went out viral on Monday that was sent out by the Birmingham Police Department was an edited version of the bodycam.

  And so I started then, however, looking at as many different angles that I received from the city attorney, because they were somewhat shocked initially that the Birmingham Police Department released that bodycam without advice of the city attorney. That's number one.

  And that's when I realized they released it for the purpose of trying to get ahead of the story to make the public or — no more than a ruse to the public, because they wanted to get ahead of it to make it appear as if they were innocent.

• Amna Nawaz:

  Mr. Mims, you have mentioned previously how hard it was to know all of this was unfolding in front of your students.

  And we can hear on that video some of their screams in the background as this is unfolding. Tell us about if you have talked to any of them, if you have heard from any of them, and what those concerns are based on.

• Johnny Mims:

  We have — of course, I have had many students, alumni students I have taught in the past, many students.

  And I think the biggest thing for everybody to understand, for these students, alumni, parents, the community, the band community, many people are having just — they're having a hard time grappling of why they would, of course, Tase a educator in front of the students, and, more importantly, for something as simple as the band was playing a song and was towards the end of the song to complete.

  I mean, it seemed like it's a very minor thing that led up to me being Tased multiple times. And I think that's the thing that most of the students and everybody's trying to grapple with. Out of the whole — out of all of the situation, I was the person that received all of the Tasing, the rough threats, and all of the different things that came from the police department.

  And that's not acceptable. And, as you can see in other interviews from parents that were there, you can see that a lot of those type of things in regards threats, to aggressiveness from the police department happened even while we were getting there.

  As soon as we get off the bus, they were already experiencing those things. And so it was just not acceptable. And it's something that should never have happened. You hear the officers say: "Hey, I'm going to call your superintendent."

  That would be the process of what should have happened. It should have been a contact of superintendent, so they could get in contact with my administrator. And the administrator would have communicated that to us well in advance, which would have prevented all of this.

  And, more importantly, we have to also keep in mind making sure we — somebody turned off the lights. That further caused a confusion among the students, parents and the fans that were there.

• Amna Nawaz:

  That is Johnny Mims and his lawyer, Juandalynn Givan, who's also an Alabama state representative, joining us tonight.

  Thank you both so much for your time. We appreciate it.

• Johnny Mims:

  Thank you.

• Rep. Juandalynn Givan:

  Thank you so much.