Witnesses of Rainbow Lounge raid share details at public chat session at Buzzbrews in Dallas

ConcernedFWCitizen, says:

These same people who allege that their rights have been trampled upon had an opportunity last night to meet with Fort Worth police and a Fort Worth councilman at an open forum. They did not. These same people are being called upon to file official statements with the FWPD, as a part of the ongoing investigation. Between Sunday and Tuesday, only 2 statements were given.

These same people who allege wrongdoing have posted pictures from the bar that show one person being subdued while resisting arrest, and another person being questioned. Cell phones are great things...most, these day, can take pictures, video and audio. So the only logical conclusion over why no video, audio or pictures of beat-downs occurring is because they, in fact, never occurred.

Further, calling a handful of officers in a bar that had more than 100 patrons a raid is beyond laughable. Want to see a raid? Go look at some of the bartenders who have posted on other articles, who describe full SWAT, VICE and armored teams swarming in and processing every single patron with numerous arrests. Clearly was not the case here.

In order to bring success and legitimacy to the gay rights movement, people need to rally together over shared beliefs. Unfortunately, some people have chosen to fictionalized a COMMON bar check that is performed nightly on many bars into a brutal gay-bashing event. Get real. The cops have far better things to do than pick on people because they are gay, black, hispanic, women, college students, or any other subset. And by the way, yes, white cops are routinely sent into black bars. And black cops are routinely sent into hispanic bars. And gay cops are routinely sent into straight bars. Who the heck cares who checks which types of bars? A bar is a bar, and a cop is a cop. Demographics wouldn't be an issue of people looking for a rallying cry didn't choose to make them one.

Mark_Reed, says:

ConcernedFWCitizen...get your facts straight.

These "same people" met with Halstead last night. From the Star Telegram this a.m.:

"Halstead spoke at a police-community forum that had already been scheduled at New Beginnings International Church to discuss concerns of residents in Fort Worth’s eastern policing district.

But several members of the gay and lesbian community attended and questioned Halstead about Sunday’s incident

"Why didn’t they do something?" asked Elizabeth Pax, ambassador for Queer Liberaction, a Dallas-based advocacy group. "Why didn’t your officers speak up?"

These "same people" are organizing people to show up next week at the Ft. Worth council meeting.

ConcernedFWCitizen....how many photos do you need to prove police brutality? 5-6 large cops brutally arresting Chad isn't enough? A Photo of Chad's bruised face doesn't suggest excessive force?

ConcernedFWCitizen...calling 7-8 police cars and a paddy wagon showing up to a gay bar as something just "normal" is b.s. The Stonewall Raid had six patrol officers and two detectives. Wanna question that whether that was a raid or not?

ConcernedFWCitzen...why don't you have the guts to display your name. You continue to post all over the place with an obvious bias against activists you don't like.

To the rest of our community that actually do care and are concerned about Chad...show up tonight at the Rainbow Lounge at 8:30 for a candlelight vigil. His injury is very serious and we need to show that we care and support him....unlike our "brother" ConcernedFWCitzen.

We cannot rest until the Ft Worth PD and TABC are held fully accountable for this unjust raid on our community. To be silent will result in it happening again.

Mark Reed

ch0, says:

There are gay cops??

ConcernedFWCitizen, says:

Of course a common bar check includes arrests. What else would you expect them to do when they found people who were publicly intoxicated? I stand by my previous comments about this not being a raid. Clearly, you've never been in a bar that was actually raided. And finally, I was at the meeting with Chief Halstead. He asked the crowd who among them were at the bar. A few hands went up. Then he asked who among them had seen excessive force being used. Everyone looked around...and yet...silence. Dead silence. I will also be at the council meeting...and I expect a similar show.

I'm not biased against activists. I wish activists fighting for equal rights the best. I am, however, biased against liars, exaggerators and those who seek to turn a bar check that was conducted according to the standard of the law into a rallying cry.