VIDEO: Black Good Samaritan arrested after helping drunk neighbor

“If I had blond hair and blue eyes, this wouldn’t be an issue,” the victim, Samir Ahmed, told news outlets on Tuesday..

Nov 28, 2018

New video footage has surfaced that shows a Black man in Silver Spring, Md., being arrested after walking a drunken neighbor home.

Samir Ahmed discovered his drunk neighbor passed out on his lawn and decided to walk him home on November 17, according to CBS affiliate WUSA9.

During the good deed, the 23-year-old ran into Montgomery County police officers who had been called to assist a drunken man in the neighborhood. An officer then “detected a strong odor of marijuana emanating” from Ahmed, which gave them probable cause to search him, the report said.

In a video recorded by a bystander, concerned neighbors can clearly be heard telling police that Ahmed lives in the neighborhood and had just helped the drunk person they were looking for get home. But despite their insistence, an officer replies, “I think you’re the intoxicated one.”

During the nearly 20 minute clip, police are heard laughing at the situation and informing witnesses who challenged Ahmed’s arrest that “we don’t answer to you.”

Police eventually found a small bag of marijuana on the young man. He was charged with resisting arrest, disorderly conduct and a few other unspecified offenses, the report said

Once the video of his arrest shared to social media, it was reposted by comedian D.L. Hughley and has since gone viral.

“If I had blond hair and blue eyes, this wouldn’t be an issue,” Ahmed said Tuesday.

In a statement released Wednesday morning, the Montgomery County Police Department said it is “aware of the concerns voiced by some community members” about the incident.

“The Department is reviewing the circumstances surrounding the arrest to determine if any Department policies, procedures or laws were violated during the incident,” the statement read. “This assessment will include a review of the responding officers’ body-worn camera footage.”

Ahmed has been given a January court date, but his lawyer, J. Wyndal Gordon said officers searched his client under false pretenses.

“We vehemently dispute that the officer smelled marijuana; you can’t smell marijuana in a baggie inside of his left coat pocket that hasn’t been burned,” Gordon said. “It’s a very negligible amount, if anything,” he added.

Ahmed says three of his neighbors, including the person who took the video, have filed a complaint against Montgomery police in a show of solidarity.