Police appear to try to tip man out of his wheelchair in video

San Francisco police say they are investigating a video that appears to show a San Francisco police officer trying to tip a man out of his electric wheelchair during a stop.

The video of the incident, which occurred Sunday, has stirred controversy in the Bay Area. It shows a man in an electric wheelchair approach police who are talking to a group of people. An officer appears to move the man’s wheelchair, then another tries to tip him out of his wheelchair and onto the curb.

But a second man quickly steps in and helps.

The wheelchair user, identified as Bo Frierson, told KGO-TV he hurried over to help a group of friends, then police started pushing his wheelchair.

But luckily, he said, he was wearing his seatbelt, or he likely would have fallen out of his wheelchair. In the video, an officer claims Frierson, who is paralyzed with a spinal cord injury, ran over his foot, but he denied it.

Officer Grace Gatpandan said officers were patrolling the area of Sunnydale Avenue and Hahn Street about 4:01 p.m. when they saw some people in a “heated” argument.

Officers approached the group to investigate and cited four people, she said in a statement.

Gatpandan said that because the incident involved a police officer, further details would not be released.

The encounter, she said, will be investigated by the San Francisco Police Department’s Internal Affairs Division and the Office of Citizen Complaints.

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