A Texas man captured a now-viral video of his Black wife being stopped and ticketed by police for walking on the wrong side of the road. The couple is now demanding an apology, claiming that cops escalated a simple incident into an “excessive show of power.”
Brad Townes captured footage of two police officers stopping his wife Akia as they walked around their neighborhood in Groves, Texas, seeking for their lost puppy. “Can’t walk while Black in Groves,” Townes, who is white, says twice in the video.
The video shows a female police officer approaching Townes and showing him the traffic law on her cellphone. “She was not walking on this side of the road,” the officer states. “What does it matter?” Townes responded. “It’s a traffic violation,” the officer insists. “No it’s not,” Townes countered.
‼️WALKING WHILE BLACK
📍The Grove | Texas
A Black Woman Was Searching For Her Lost Dog In Her Own Neighborhood With No Sidewalks Two Houses Down From Her Own House.
That’s When Grove City Police Officers Stopped And Detained Her For Walking On The Wrong Side Of The Street. pic.twitter.com/rgT6vHjXxp
— i Expose Racists & Pedos (@SeeRacists) April 3, 2025
During the stop, the married couple discovered that Akia was being arrested for a driving violation. “Oh she’s detained for being Black and walking in Groves,” Townes says. “I don’t care, give her a ticket, it ain’t gonna stick. Walking while Black in Groves.” “This is ridiculous,” he says later in the video.
Akia Townes told KFDM that the traffic stop happened just two doors down from her and her husband’s home. “Two cops stopped me. They walked out with their hands on their guns, and then they asked me to see my ID,” Townes recounted.
If there is no sidewalk on the road, pedestrians must walk on the left side facing incoming vehicles, according to Texas Transportation Code. The video shows Akia on the right side of the road.
As the couple challenged the stop, the two responding officers requested support from other officers. According to the Groves Police Department, four officers responded, including two who were in field training and observing their training officers. Townes stated that she was cited for the driving violation, but she and her husband have engaged an attorney to challenge the citation.
“It’s just very an excessive force of power for me just trying to go and find my dog,” Akia Townes said. “You could have easily said, ‘Hey, ma’am,’ and I could have explained to you what I was trying to do, but then you threatened my husband and threatened me to go to jail.” “I feel like they looked and saw an easy target, and nobody was going to come and defend and nobody was going to come help,” Akia’s husband Brad added.
The Groves Police Department issued information on citations for the same violation, revealing that eight individuals have been charged with that same infraction since January 1, 2023, including five white people, two Asians, and one Black person. “We want to be able to make a difference in making our community safer,” Groves City Marshal Chris Robin said in response to the viral incident, adding that the police department doesn’t tolerate racism.
Officers from The Grove, Texas make all officers look shamefully bad for ticketing a Black woman for walking on wrong side of the road where she lives while looking for her dog. #walkingwhileblack pic.twitter.com/NwSseLGgxV
— Hovermancop (@HovermanCop) April 8, 2025
“We’ve seen so many different minor ordinance violations turn into something tragic, and we don’t want that to occur.” Langston Adams, the couple’s attorney, believes the stop was racially motivated. “It’s not a question of whether she was breaking the law. We believe it’s selective enforcement and racial profiling,” Adams said.
“Why didn’t the husband get a ticket? He was also walking on the wrong side of the road and he’s white. I believe they used her walking on the wrong side of the road as a pretext to stop her,” added his attorney.
