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Alabama dockside brawl was racially motivated, riverboat captain says

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A boat captain at the centre of the viral dockside brawl in Montgomery, Alabama, has said he believes the attack on his colleague that launched the melee was racially motivated.

Capt Jim Kittrell was trying to dock the Harriott II riverboat on Saturday when he was stopped by a pontoon boat parked where his vessel was meant to come in.

After 45 minutes of waiting, he sent his deckhand Damian Pickett, who is Black, to shore to ask the pontoon boat’s owners, who are white, to move - but the request was not well received. Viral video captured the owners punching Mr Pickett before an all-out brawl ensued - largely along racial lines.

Three men are now facing charges over the incident - though police say they did not find enough evidence to support hate crime charges.

Mr Kittrell disagreed with that finding as he spoke out about the ordeal for the first time in an interview with the Daily Beast .

“The white guys that attacked my deckhand—and he was a senior deckhand first mate—I can’t think of any other reason they attacked him other than it being racially motivated,” he said.

Three white men facing charges in Alabama riverboat brawl are identified as police share detailed account

At the time of the incident, Mr Kittrell was transporting 227 passengers on the Harriot II, a riverboat that provides two-hour cruises up and down the Alabama River.

Upon reaching the end of this particular trip, the boat became stuck yards away from the dock for almost an hour because the pontoon boat owners reportedly ignored repeated requests to move.

“This whole thing is just because these guys were being assholes,” Mr Kittrell said. “I was nice as a peach when I was talking to them at first: ‘Please, help me out here, fellas. Move the boat up a little bit.’”

Mr Kittrell told the Daily Beast that he only needed “two or three feet” to navigate the Harriott II to the dock safely. However, the pontoon boat owners, who Mr Kittrell said were obviously intoxicated, continued to not comply with the requests, so the captain was forced to call 911.

When Mr Pickett reached the dock in a smaller vessell, he lightly pushed the pontoon boat forward by a few feet, moving it from the riverboat’s space. Chaos ensued.

The viral footage captures the next few minutes of the exchange, in which Mr Pickett, a Black man, is punched by one of the pontoon boat owners, a white man.

Other people from the pontoon boat, all of whom are white, joined in the fray, assaulting both Mr Pickett and the 16-year-old boy who had taken Mr Pickett to the dock in the smaller vessel, police said.

Three people on the pontoon are facing assault charges , the police chief said. Police identified them as Richard Roberts, 48, Allen Todd, 23, and Zachary Shipman, 25. Although police considered pressing hate crimes, they did not find enough evidence to support such charges, Police Chief Darryl Albert explained.

Explaining why he thinks that finding is incorrect, Mr Kittrell said: “All [Mr Pickett] did was move their boat up three feet. It makes no sense to have six people try to beat the snot out of you just because you moved their boat up a few feet. In my opinion, the attack on Damien was racially motivated.”

Beyond the initial exchange, Mr Kittrell conceded that the rest of the fight “was not Black and white.”

“It was just shipmates trying to help a shipmate,” the captain said. “They could’ve been little green men, for all they cared. When they attacked Damien, my crew was gonna jump out and do the best they could to help him out. It was my crew against the people who attacked their shipmate, that’s all it was.”

Chief Albert explicitly said that the people aboard the pontoon boat were not local to Montgomery. “This is not indicative of who we are as a city. We are much better than that,” he said.

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Riverboat Captain: Wild Dockside Attack on My Deckhand WAS Racially Motivated

“It makes no sense to have six people try to beat the snot out of you just because you moved their boat up a few feet,” Harriott II skipper Jim Kittrell told The Daily Beast.

Justin Rohrlich

Racism was at the heart of a dockside melee in Alabama that went viral over the weekend, according to the captain of the vessel whose Black crewman was attacked by a clutch of allegedly intoxicated white pleasure boaters.

“This whole thing is just because these guys were being assholes,” Capt. Jim Kittrell told The Daily Beast in an interview on Tuesday. “I was nice as a peach when I was talking to them at first: ‘Please, help me out here, fellas. Move the boat up a little bit.’”

The fracas began on Saturday evening when Kittrell found a pontoon boat docked in the spot reserved for the sightseeing riverboat Harriott II. He asked the boat’s owners over his PA system to move but was ignored, according to police. So Kittrell said a friend of his brought a smaller craft out to the Harriott II so a senior deckhand could go ashore and clear the way for the larger vessel, carrying 227 passengers, to dock. Kittrell said he only needed “two or three feet” to maneuver the Harriott II in safely, but after the clearly intoxicated people on the pontoon boat continued to simply disregard him, he had no choice but to call 911.

When Kittrell’s deckhand, Damien Pickett, got to the dock, he carefully pushed the pontoon boat forward by a few feet, so Harriott II could disgorge its passengers. Bystander video showed Pickett, who is Black, trying to reason with the pontoon boaters, who were white. Suddenly, a young white man rushed Pickett and punched him in the face. Other white men and women from the pontoon boat quickly jumped in, assaulting both Pickett and the 16-year-old boy who had taken Pickett ashore, police said Tuesday. (The teen is a deckhand trainee, and the only white member of the Harriott II’s crew, Kittrell said.)

Seeing his outnumbered shipmate being pummeled, one of Pickett’s colleagues—a teenager now known affectionately online as Black Aquaman—swam in to help; several others came to his aid once Harriott II tied up. At this point, the dynamic shifted and the ones who initially brutalized Pickett soon found themselves overpowered in an all-out brawl that appeared to be divided along racial lines.

Three of Pickett’s attackers—Richard Roberts, 48, Allen Todd, 23, and Zachary Shipman, 25— now have warrants out for their arrest for third-degree assault, Montgomery Police Chief Darryl Albert said Tuesday. Reggie Gray, a 42-year-old Black man seen walloping some of Pickett’s attackers with a folding chair, was also wanted for further questioning. While Albert said investigators did not find enough evidence to substantiate hate crime charges, Kittrell believes otherwise.

“The white guys that attacked my deckhand—and he was a senior deckhand first mate—I can’t think of any other reason they attacked him other than it being racially motivated,” Kittrell said. “All he did was move their boat up three feet. It makes no sense to have six people try to beat the snot out of you just because you moved their boat up a few feet. In my opinion, the attack on Damien was racially motivated.”

The rest of the fight, however, “was not Black and white,” according to Kittrell.

“It was just shipmates trying to help a shipmate,” he said. “They could’ve been little green men, for all they cared. When they attacked Damien, my crew was gonna jump out and do the best they could to help him out. It was my crew against the people who attacked their shipmate, that’s all it was.”

Kittrell described any ship’s crew as more of a brotherhood than that of a typical work relationship. He said he has known Pickett for 10 years, setting off on voyages together that are sometimes several days long. They have grown to care deeply about each other, as have the rest of the crewmen, Kittrell said.

At the same time, Pickett is over 40, diabetic, and has hypertension, according to Kittrell.

“He’s not someone who wants to be out there throwing fists,” he went on. “He shouldn’t be. It got me really mad, sitting up there in the wheelhouse knowing there was nothing I could do. I didn’t see it coming; on the boat, I’m three floors up. The whole time, I’m yelling on the PA, ‘Stop! Somebody help!’ It was all I could do.”

The three men facing charges over the attack on Pickett were not familiar to Kittrell, he said. However, he said he recognized them as part of a group of seven or eight pontoon boat owners who travel from Selma to Montgomery each year.

Boaters “tend to be happy and friendly people, they’re normally not a problem,” Kittrell said. This particular set, conversely, has previously caused trouble, he went on, blaming them for once having stolen a golf cart the Harriott II used to transport disabled passengers between the ferry and the parking lot.

But, said Kittrell, “Stealing the golf cart was a joke, a prank. There’s never been any kind of serious trouble like this.”

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'Just in shock': Dock worker assaulted in Montgomery brawl speaks out in 'GMA' exclusive

Nearly two months after a brawl at Riverfront Park in Montgomery, Alabama , went viral, Dameion Pickett, a dock worker who was at the center of the melee after he was assaulted by a group of boaters, spoke out about the incident in an exclusive interview with "Good Morning America."

Pickett, who is the lead deckhand of the Harriot II, reflected on what led up to the altercation and told "GMA" co-anchor Robin Roberts that he was just "just doing my job" and was "just in shock" when he was violently attacked.

"I didn't expect this to happen at work today," Pickett said. "I was just expecting another peaceful, nice cruise."

Arrest warrants issued after boaters attack dock employee at Montgomery riverbank

According to Pickett, as the Harriott II was ending a dinner cruise and getting ready to dock, a private pontoon boat was illegally parked in its place, preventing the riverboat from docking safely.

"We could have docked, but we would end up hitting a couple of those boats and be responsible for it," Pickett said.

According to Pickett and witnesses aboard the Harriett II who spoke with ABC News, crew members made several attempts to ask the owner of the pontoon boat to move it, but their calls were ignored.

"Everybody was yelling, "Could y'all move y'all boat?" Pickett said.

It was then that Pickett said he got off the riverboat "by the captain's orders" and went to move the pontoon boat himself.

"Really just moved it about one, two, four-- four steps to the right, that's it," he said.

"I was, like, 'I'm just doing my job … After we dock, we don't mind y'all staying there but not at this time while we're trying to dock,'" he added.

Moments after Pickett moved the boat, videos show that he was confronted and punched by a man and soon after, others attacked Pickett and were later identified by police as a boat owner and his family.

Pickett said that after he was assaulted, he had to defend himself.

"This man just put his hand on me. I was, like … it's my job, but I'm still defending myself at the same time. So when he touched me, I was, like, 'It's on,'" Pickett said.

According to videos captured by bystanders and obtained by ABC News, the incident led to a massive brawl that started between the individuals who attacked Pickett, all of whom were white, prompting several Black eyewitnesses to join a fight in an apparent attempt to defend Pickett, including a viral video of a teenager later identified as Aaren Hamilton-Rudolph swimming to the dock to defend him.

Hamilton-Rudolph, a 16-year-old who was only on his second week on the job, reflected on what made him swim to Pickett's defense in an interview with "GMA."

"Everybody was just recording. No one helped," Hamilton-Rudolph said. "So I couldn't just watch and sit around and just let him get beat on while everybody else is just recording and watching."

Roshein "RahRah" Carlton, Pickett's coworker and friend, also rushed to his defense.

"It's our duty as-- as our coworker, as a team, to go and aid and assist him," Carlton told "GMA."

Pickett said that "some nasty words" were directed at him when he got attacked, while Carlton claimed that he heard "a lot of racial slurs" being used during the incident.

The incident was investigated by the Montgomery Police Department, leading to misdemeanor assault charges against four white individuals, all of whom are now out on bond and set to appear in court for a hearing this week.

Montgomery Police Department Chief Darryl Albert identified Pickett and an unnamed 16-year-old white male who was allegedly struck by the owners and operators of the private boat as victims in this case during a press conference on Aug. 7.

The incident led to charges against five individuals.

Alabama riverfront melee: 5th suspect turns himself in, police say

Richard Roberts was charged with two counts of assault in the third degree, court records show. Meanwhile, Allen Todd, Zachary Shipman and Mary Todd were all charged with assault in the third degree. All have pleaded not guilty .

ABC News has attempted to reach out to the suspects and their attorneys, but requests for comment were not returned.

A fifth arrest was made days later when Reggie Ray, a Black man who was seen attacking someone with a beach chair in a viral video, was charged with disorderly conduct. He also pleaded not guilty.

Ray's attorney, Lee Merritt, told ABC News that his client had a "limited role" in the brawl and was "involuntarily roped into the disorderly conduct initiated by a violent white mob."

Asked if there's any evidence of a hate crime, Albert said that police "looked at every avenue" and left "no stone unturned" but "were unable to present any insight in a riot or racial racially biased charges at this time."

A spokesperson for the Montgomery Police Department told ABC News on Friday that there are no additional updates to share regarding the investigation.

Pickett told Roberts that all he wanted to do was make sure that the Harriott II, which was carrying more than 200 passengers at the time, was able to dock safely.

"I had a responsibility," he said. "I was still trying to get that boat in while the fight was still going on. I'm still telling the captain, 'We gotta get these folks here safely to this dock.'"

Asked how he was doing after the incident, Pickett said, "I'm just a little-- a little sore, little bumps and bruises here and there. But I'm here by the grace of God."

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‘I Can’t Think of Any Other Reason’: Captain of Riverboat Connected to Alabama Brawl Says Attack on Black Worker Was Racially Motivated

Racism lies at the core of the melee at an Alabama dock that gained widespread attention over the weekend, according to the captain of the Riverfront Park boat connected to the chaos.

The vessel’s captain, Capt. Jim Kittrell says the confrontation, which unfolded between his crew, consisting of Black members, and a group of reportedly intoxicated white boaters, was fueled by racial tensions.

Damien Pickett Attacked at Montgomery Riverfront Park.

The captain’s statement comes as the local authorities and FBI have ruled out hate crimes in the case.

“This whole thing is just because these guys were being a- -holes,” Kittrell told The Daily Beast. “I was nice as a peach when I was talking to them at first: ‘Please, help me out here, fellas. Move the boat up a little bit.’”

On Saturday evening, Kittrell discovered a pontoon boat occupying the designated area reserved for the Harriott II, a cruise vessel that offers dinner, dancing, and live entertainment, at Montgomery’s Riverfront Park.

Using his public address system, he politely asked the pontoon boat’s owners to relocate. However, his request was met with indifference, as the pontoon boat occupants ignored him.

Kittrell’s friend brought a smaller vessel to help clear the path for the larger Harriott II, carrying 227 passengers. The plan was to have a senior deckhand, Damien Pickett, go ashore and assist in maneuvering the Harriott II into position, requiring just a slight adjustment of a few feet.

Despite these efforts, the people on the pontoon boat continued to disregard Kittrell’s requests, forcing him to eventually call 911 for assistance.

“They started shooting birds at us, so I called the police,” Kittrell said.

When Pickett got to the dock, he carefully pushed the pontoon boat forward by a few feet so that Harriott II could remove its passengers.

Bystander video showed Pickett, who is Black, trying to reason with the pontoon boaters, who were white. Suddenly, a young white man rushed Pickett and punched him in the face. Other white men and women from the pontoon boat quickly jumped in, assaulting both Pickett and the 16-year-old boy who had taken Pickett ashore, police said Tuesday.

Other reports list Pickett’s position as co-captain of the vessel.

One of Pickett’a colleagues, now dubbed “Black Aquaman” online, swam over to provide assistance. Several others debarked and ran to Pickett’s aid, turning on the white boaters in an all-out brawl across the dock.

Three of Pickett’s alleged attackers — Richard Roberts, 48, Allen Todd, 23, and Zachary Shipman, 25 — now have warrants out for their arrest for third-degree assault, Montgomery Police Chief Darryl Albert said Tuesday.

“I can’t think of any other reason they attacked him other than it being racially motivated,” Kittrell said. “All he did was move their boat up three feet. It makes no sense to have six people try to beat the snot out of you just because you moved their boat up a few feet. In my opinion, the attack on Damien was racially motivated.”

Based on the latest data from the Department of Justice regarding hate crimes, the majority of reported offenses are directed toward individuals due to their race, ethnicity, or ancestral background.

In an unprompted call with local radio station News Talk 93.1 FM, Kittrell said the response to the attack was not a “black and white thing.”

“I had every single white crew member male on the boat was on the dock. This was our crew upset about these idiots,” he said, adding that he was familiar with the group of boaters.

“They’re from Selma. And, we’ve had trouble with them in the past, but just like jokey things. Like, a couple of years ago, this same group was here,” Kittrell said. “We came back from a cruise and our golf cart was missing. … We finally found it in the Hampton Inn lobby. We looked at the Hampton Inn video. Found out who did it and we had them come down. We were going to press charges then, but the police talked us out of it.”

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Crew Members At The Center Of Montgomery Riverfront Brawl Speak Out

Three Black crew members at the center of the viral riverfront brawl in Montgomery, Alabama, have recounted their experience in a new interview with ABC’s “ Good Morning America ” on Monday.

Dameion Pickett, the lead deckhand of The Harriott II riverboat, told “Good Morning America” that he was just doing his job and was in “shock” when he was attacked while trying to dock the city-owned boat on Aug. 5.

Before the attack, the riverboat, which had more than 200 passengers aboard, was held up by an illegally docked boat that was blocking the riverboat from its spot . Pickett asked the white boaters to move their vessel multiple times so that passengers could get off the boat. Instead of moving the boat, a white man attacked Pickett and a brawl broke out moments later as more white people joined the fight and Pickett’s colleagues rushed to defend him. The brawl quickly became an internet conversation piece after multiple videos of the confrontation surfaced on social media. Many people were quick to point out the racial tensions in the video or joke about the fight.

Pickett, who is seen in the viral video throwing his hat in the air, told “GMA” co-anchor Robin Roberts that he went to move the smaller boat himself since the white boaters, who he claims had been drinking, refused to move it.

“This man just put his hand on me. I was, like … it’s my job, but I’m still defending myself at the same time. So when he touched me, I was, like, ‘It’s on,’” Pickett said.

As the fight continued, Roshein “RahRah” Carlton, a steward on the ship, and 16-year-old employee Aaren Hamilton-Rudolph, who was seen swimming to the dock in a video, went to help Pickett.

“It’s our duty as― as our co-worker, as a team, to go and aid and assist him,” Carlton said in the interview, recalling that the white boaters were using racial slurs.

Hamilton-Rudolph shared a similar sentiment about wanting to have Pickett’s back.

“Everybody was just recording. No one helped,” Hamilton-Rudolph added. “So I couldn’t just watch and sit around and just let him get beat on while everybody else is just recording and watching.”

In a written statement to police at the time, Pickett said that he was hanging on “for dear life” as several white boaters attacked him.

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Initially, 13 people were detained and released. However, just four white people and one Black person face misdemeanor charges in connection with the brawl, and each of them has pleaded not guilty, The Associated Press reported earlier this month.

From Our Partner

Montgomery Riverboat captain speaks on Saturday brawl – 'This was not a black and white thing'

The vessel's captain at the center of the recent Riverfront Brawl in Montgomery has now given his side of the story that has grabbed national headlines.

On Saturday, police responded to a call regarding a disturbance in the Riverfront Park. While several people were detained, no arrests have been made. Mayor Steven Reed announced a press conference for Tuesday at 1 p.m. for further updates.

In a surprise call-in to 93.1 "News & Views with Joey Clark," Jim Kittrell, captain of the Harriott II – a famous riverboat that traverses the Alabama River, spoke about Saturday night's brawl from his perspective.

According to Kittrell, he was pulling the Harriott II into the dock when he noticed a pontoon boat partially blocking the way to the disembarkation ramp. He asked the boat's passengers over his PA system to move the boat "about five times."

After threatening to call the police for their refusal to move the boat, he also offered that police would see the alcohol on the pontoon boat should they be called out.

"They started shooting birds at us, so I called the police," Kittrell said.

After waiting some time, the owners reportedly left, leaving the boat blocking the entrance. Kittrell then asked another pedalboat captain to use the smaller craft to ferry Kittrell's senior deckhand to move the boat.

"[I]n the boating world, it's common if you have to move somebody's boat, it's nothing to get upset about," Kittrell said. "You know, you have to move a boat sometimes."…After they moved it, those guys came running back. They must have still been in the park or up in the gazebo or something."

SEE ALSO: Mayor Steven Reed, political opponent Barrett Gilbreath react to Montgomery Riverfront brawl: 'Justice will be served'

"We're 40 yards or 30 yards away from the dock watching all of this. There's nothing we can do. About that time, another guy comes running up. And, within a minute or so, it was an all-out brawl. And then I saw some more guys coming, and I said, 'Oh. Thank God. They're going to break it up.' But instead of breaking it up, they jumped on him too. So, at one time, it was like six, seven guys on my deckhand that was trying to move the boat."

Kittrell said 15 minutes after his call, around 15 police officers showed up at the scene. After which, his deckhand motioned the Harriott II to dock.

"As soon as the boat hits the dock, some of my crew, who saw my first-mate Damian being attacked, felt they had to retaliate. Which was unfortunate. I wish we could have stopped that from happening, but when you see something like that, and it was difficult. It was difficult for me to sit there in the wheelhouse, watching him being attacked. And the whole time I'm on the PA, 'Stop. Stop.' You know? 'The police are here. Stop.' But it wasn't even stopping them. So, once we get to the dock, that's when the little bit of the melee started and finally the police got control of it. I'm just so thankful that nobody had a weapon."

Kittrell said that this group with which his crew engaged had a history of causing problems on the Riverfront. Due to the original melee involving several white people attacking the black deckhand, some have speculated the brawl may have been racially motivated. Kittrell said, without being asked by the host, that there was no racial component to the event.

"One point I do want to make, this was not a black and white thing," Kittrell explained. "I had every single white crew member male on the boat was on the dock. This was our crew upset about these idiots. This is the same group that comes every year. They're from Selma. And, we've had trouble with them in the past, but just like jokey things. Like, a couple of years ago, this same group was here. We came back from a cruise and our golf cart was missing. …we finally found it in the Hampton Inn lobby. We looked at the Hampton Inn video. Found out who did it and we had them come down. We were going to press charges then, but the police talked us out of it."

He continued, "We just don't want this thing to get out of control as being a black-and-white thing, that's not the case at all. It was shipmates that were trying to take up for their hurt crew member."

Kittrell said several of the crew are pressing charges.

To connect with the author of this story or to comment, email [email protected] .

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Black riverfront worker said he ‘hung on for dear life’ during Montgomery attack

In his written deposition to Montgomery police, filed hours after he was attacked at the city’s riverfront last weekend, dock worker Dameion Pickett said he “hung on for dear life” as he was pummeled by a group of white boaters who disregarded his requests to move their boat so a dinner cruise vessel could dock.

NBC News obtained the handwritten account Pickett filed with law enforcement after the Aug. 5 melee.

Pickett, who has yet to speak publicly about the incident and did not respond to a request for comment, detailed the moments leading up to the fracas, which was captured on video. In his statement, he recounts the battle between white disruptive boaters and the cadre of Black people who came to his aid.

Mary Todd, one woman who jumped into the melee, was taken into custody Thursday by the Montgomery Police Department and charged with third-degree assault. On Wednesday night, two of the three men initially charged in the altercation — Allen Todd, 23, and Zachary Shipman, 25 — turned themselves in to face third-degree assault charges. Richard Roberts, 48, was already in custody. They did not answer requests for comment about Pickett’s account of events.

Pickett wrote that crew members asked the occupants of the pontoon boat, through an intercom, to move it “five or six times.” When Pickett left the cruise vessel, Harriott II, to confront the passengers of the smaller boat, he heard passengers shouting to the rowdy boaters to “move your boat. You’re in the way.”

The men on the pontoon responded by “giving us the finger” for about three minutes, Pickett wrote.

Eventually, he and a dockhand untied the pontoon boat and moved it “three steps to the right” and tied it back to a post so the Harriott II could dock.

“By that time, two people ran up behind me,” Pickett wrote. One of the men, in a red hat, yelled to Pickett, “Don’t touch that boat motherf— or we will beat your ass.”

“I told them, ‘No, you won’t,’” he wrote. Pickett said they were unaware that he had given the captain the go-ahead to dock the Harriott II. The men continued to threaten Pickett, he said, and he told them: “Do what you’ve got to do, I’m just doing my job.”

One white man called another white man over to the scene. “They both were very drunk,” Pickett wrote. Another man came over to “try to calm them down” and then the boat’s owner came over. Pickett explained that the signs denoting where to park had been taken down by someone, so he had to tell them where to move the boat to make room for the Harriott II.

The boat’s owner, wearing a gray shirt and red shorts with a sun visor, “started getting loud … He got into my face. ‘This belongs to the f— public.’ I told him this was a city dock.”

Soon, the melee began. “By that time,” Pickett wrote, “a tall, older white guy came over and hit me in the face. I took my hat off and threw it in the air. Somebody hit me from behind. I started choking the older guy in front of me so he couldn’t anymore, pushing him back at the same time.

“Then the guy in the red shorts came up and tackled me … I went to the ground. I think I hit one of them.”

He said the attackers littered him with threats as they ganged up on him. “I’m gonna kill you, motherf—--. Beat your ass, motherf—--.”

“I can’t tell you how long it lasted,” Pickett wrote. “I grabbed one of them and just held on for dear life.”

Eventually, Pickett said he looked up and help had arrived. “Two people were pulling them off me.” He described the assistance as coming from a tall Black man and a security guard. After struggling to his feet, Pickett said he looked up and “one of my co-workers had jumped into the water and was pushing people and fighting.”

While being held by someone, Pickett asked to be released so he could dock the boat. He gave the necessary orders to the captain to park the vessel.

Witnesses say a large brawl that broke out on an Alabama riverfront was fueled by alcohol and adrenaline.

Meanwhile, “my nose was running … and I could hear passengers and co-workers arguing with the people who attacked me.”

The Harriott II docked and when the ramp came down for passengers to disembark, Pickett’s nephew “ran off the boat and went after them. I was screaming for him to come back.”

The nephew did not come back and the encounter escalated.

“The security guard was trying to get the lady in red to leave; she wouldn’t listen. People from off the boat and spectators were coming down the back end of the dock. The guy who started it all was choking my sister. I hit him, grabbed her and moved her … I turned around and MPD had a taser in my face. I told him I was the one being attacked and could I finish doing my job.”

The back of the cruise vessel had not been tied to the dock. Pickett, despite the chaos around him, helped passengers off the boat with the aid of police. He apologized to them “for the inconvenience. They all said I did nothing wrong,” he wrote. “Some of them were giving me cards with their names and numbers on it. Some said they had it all on film, so I pointed them out to MPD.”

At some point, Pickett said he was led to a medic, “where I sat for 25 or 30 minutes. My head was hurting. I felt a knot in the back of my head and the front.”

With coaxing, he sought treatment in the emergency room, where he was shown to have bruised ribs and bumps on his head, but no broken bones.

Curtis Bunn is a reporter for NBC BLK.