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What should have been a routine bank withdrawal ended up with the arrest of Ryan Coogler, the film producer of “Black Panther”.

According to the Atlanta Police Department, Coogler was detained after requesting to withdraw a large sum of money through a note. The withdrawal note read:

“I would like to withdraw $12,000 cash from my checking account. Please do the money count somewhere else. I’d like to be discreet.”

The bank teller, a pregnant Black woman, said that although his government ID and Bank of America card was visible, she received an alert on her computer, which led her to tell her manager, who called the police.

The police first confronted Coogler’s drivers, who told police that Coogler was a film producer. The drivers were told to describe Coogler, and concluded the description matched the one of the suspected bank robber. Th e drivers were detained, and the officers proceeded to arrest Coogler.

The Atlanta NAACP Branch believes that Coogler was racially profiled.

“The presumption is always that they’ve done something wrong, he’s here to rob us. He can’t be here to withdraw money that’s his,” said Richard Rose, president of the Atlanta NAACP Branch.

“The first reaction to oppression is resistance, secondly is acknowledgement, third is acceptance. When black people have accepted that white’s should be superior and that black folks are doing something wrong all the time, and she [the bank teller] succumbed to the same thing,” Rose said.

In their incident report, the APD stated that the arrest was a mistake and was the fault of the Bank of America.

Bank of America quickly issued the following statement:

“We deeply regret that this incident occurred. It never should have happened and we have apologized to Mr. Coogler.”

“This situation should never have happened,” said Coogler. “However, Bank of America worked with me and addressed it to my satisfaction and we have moved on.”