Uniformed soldier accosted by mentally deranged man, subdues him, and his hailed as the villian

Many will recognize Staff Sergeant Hy of the Army Reserve here for his social media videos under the handle Angry Cops. Initially his videos dealt a lot with “humanizing the badge” as is the lingo in the field. Humorous videos about cop life.

In 2016 he apparently ran afoul of civilian employer the Buffalo Police Department’s social media policy for the videos, costing him a lengthy suspension. Since then his videos have mostly dealt with military topics.

This and another suspension now are immediately used by the media to cast doubt on him. As seen in the very first sentence after the byline in this Investigative Post article;

A twice-suspended Buffalo police officer is under investigation by Internal Affairs after he was caught on camera Thursday afternoon punching a man on Elmwood Avenue.

The image conjured by this writer is one of a rogue cop, playing by his own rules, as if he were living in a 1980’s buddy cop flick.

The “reporter’s” second paragraph is even more accusatory and biased;

The officer, Richard Hy, was off-duty at the time and dressed in camouflage. He’s white, the man he punched was black, someone described by police and witnesses as displaying mental distress and violent behavior.

There’s video of the final moments of the incident. The Daily Mail has mirrored the video in their article here, and American Grit has an article exploring it. The Daily Mail’s headline is fabulously accusatory as well. “US soldier punches a black man to the ground and sits on his chest until police arrive after he lunged at him, ‘spat on his car and made disparaging remarks about the military.” Now let’s look into this a tad bit more.

It turns out Hy was in his Army uniform, presumably on his way home from some Reserve duty, when he’d stopped where this mentally deranged individual (who apparently was black we know thanks to the spectacularly unbiased reporting of the Investigative Post) was causing a disturbance. He’d been causing a disturbance for some time, which had resulted in multiple calls to Buffalo Police. The man didn’t meet the threshold for a commitment hold and he had yet to commit a crime, so the police were unable to do anything with him. Hy knew none of this when he happened across the scene.

The mentally ill man saw the uniform and targeted SSG Hy. Hy was faced with a belligerent man who was spewing anti-government invective, verbally assaulting Hy himself, spitting on Hy’s vehicle, and lunging back and forth at Hy with a skateboard in a threatening manner.

The Iraq War combat veteran and off-duty city police officer is in a defensive posture in the video, but the man confronting him was giving indications that he was about to strike. When the man lunged forward, Hy punched him with a right hook, knocking his attacker on the ground. Hy then held the man down while police were again called.

In the five minutes or so it took for on-duty personnel to respond, a crowd formed. A man in a wheelchair even came and brandished an aluminum baseball bat at the uniformed US Army NCO. Racist members of the mob repeatedly challenged the staff sergeant to a physical fight.

Of course the mob demanded Hy’s arrest, despite knowing nothing of the situation once cops arrived. The man was uninjured and was taken to a hospital to receive the mental health treatment he so sorely needs. While Hy’s holding him down the dude even thanks him, repeatedly and says “I been waiting for this.”

The story here is that a uniformed soldier of the Army Reserve was able to defend himself and protect the community. Instead, because the soldier is white, it fits the narrative. He’s a previously suspended officer. He’s in camouflage. He punches the guy with mental health problems. A black guy no less!

Hy is reported to still be on the job while department investigators look into the incident. No word on the Army’s response to this.

Category: Army, BLM, Police, Real Soldiers