Atlanta DJ claims police in Oklahoma took $150K from him during traffic stop

Dec 19, 2018
OCTOBER 14: A record dealer in Wanted Records in St Nicholas Market puts on a vinyl record on the shop's turntable on October 14, 2015 in Bristol, England. Although sales of vinyl records declined dramatically with the introduction of digital formats such as CDs and downloads it is now seen as a premium product and sales this year in the UK of newly pressed LP records on vinyl are expected to top 2million double what they were in 2014. (Photo by Matt Cardy/Getty Images)

In another instance of Driving #WhileBlack, an Atlanta DJ in the middle of a cross-country drive claims that police confiscated nearly $150,000 from him during a traffic stop.

Harvey Miller, better known as DJ Speedy, was driving from Atlanta to Los Angeles when he passed through Oklahoma City. According to KOCO, Miller was stopped by an Oklahoma County Sheriff’s deputy.

According to court documents, Miller was stopped not for speeding, but for not putting on his turn signal a full 100 feet before he changed lanes. Miller knew what this was really about.

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“I was racially profiled. Plain as day. No way around it,” Miller said. “[The deputy] went in with the questions of, ‘Where are you going? What’s in your car?'”

“Then, he asked me can he search my vehicle,” Miller said. “No, you can’t search my vehicle. What warrants do you have to search my vehicle?”

Minutes later, a K-9 unit was called to the scene, and the dog alerted to the possible presence of drugs in Miller’s car, which police later claimed was marijuana. However, court documents show that Miller was clean and there were no actual drugs found in the car.

“I’ve never used drugs. I’m not drinking. I wasn’t speeding. I wasn’t doing nothing,” Miller said. “You have nothing on me except I have money. I’m black and I have money.”

The money that he is referring to is $149,000 in cash that he was carrying in in the car. Miller told the deputies the money they found was collected for his work as a music producer.

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The police claimed to have found a counterfeit $20 bill, confiscated all of the money and arrested Miller on possession of drug proceeds and possession of a forged counterfeit note. Charges have not been filed against Miller.

He was released from jail after 12 hours in jail, and Miller is now demanding his money back and his clean record restored.

“I want to be exonerated from all this,” Miller said.

The Oklahoma County Sheriff’s Office claims that they didn’t racially profile Miller because they also arrest white people.

 “We absolutely do not racially profile individuals pulled over,” the department said in a statement. “The vast majority of the people we pull over are Caucasian. The numbers we see are in line with the makeup of the population of Oklahoma County.”

 

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