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I agree.Part of an interview with Isadore Washington by Claytee White on February 7, 2008. Washington describes arresting a white man at Gilbert's Liquor Store as a young police officer.
Isadore Washington oral history interview, 2008 February 07. OH-01923. [Audio recording] Oral History Research Center, Special Collections and Archives, University Libraries, University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Las Vegas
English
So did it change once you went on the police department? When I went on the police department, I did not — my first year nobody ever told me that a black policeman could arrest a white person. So they had a bar down at Bonanza and D Street called Gilbert's Liquor Store. That's where most of the blacks and whites would hang out. But my first year with the police department I got a call — I was working by myself. And I got a call that there was a troublemaker at the Gilbert's Liquor Store. When I got there and found out it was a white guy, and that he was raising all kind of trouble — everybody was afraid to mess with him. So when I got there and tried to cool him down, he paid no attention to me. So I had to place him under arrest. And he told me, he said, boy, you can't arrest me. You've got to call the white man. But nobody ever told me that I couldn't — my first year I'm a young 22 years old. And nobody told me that. That wasn't in my job description; that I couldn't arrest anybody. So I placed him under arrest. And then when I tried to get him into the police car, he wouldn't go. He started fighting me. So I handcuffed him and myself. And I walked him all the way down to the police station underneath the underpass. Well, we had a good time all the way to the police station. And everybody was talking, man, you can't arrest a white man. But nobody ever told me. All I know is somebody broke the law and they were under arrest and I had to get them down to the jailhouse no matter how. But I was afraid to put him in the police car because it would have probably caused a wreck or something. But under the underpass — you could walk underneath the underpass back then. So we fought all the way downtown to the police station.