'I feel this is racial profiling': Confrontation caught on camera after man calls cops over pool membership

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Friday, July 6, 2018
'I feel this is racial profiling': Man calls cops over pool membership
Jasmine Edwards said she and her son were the only black people at the pool when Adam Bloom called the police. Police say he refused to believe Edwards lived in his neighborhood.

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. -- A white man has resigned as chairman of his pool and is no longer employed by his company after a video went viral capturing the moments after he called police on a black neighbor at the pool. Police said he refused to believe she was a neighbor.

Jasmine Edwards said she and her son were the only black people at the pool. A video of the confrontation has received millions of views since Edwards posted it on her Facebook page on Wednesday.

In the video, Edwards can be heard explaining what happened before police were called. She said that Bloom asked for her address, which she gave him. He then asked for ID, and that's when Edwards got angry and Bloom called the police.

"Where does it say that I have to show an ID to use my pool? My own pool?" she asked, showing a sign of the pool rules. "And nobody else was asked their ID."

At one point, Edwards pointed out that the entrance has to be unlocked with a pool card and that the only other way she saw to enter was to jump over the fence.

"Do you know what I'm saying?" she asked. "I'm with a baby. I'm not going to throw the baby over."

After this, the officer asked if he could borrow her pool card to demonstrate to Bloom that it was valid.

Edwards' pool card opened the entrance. When the officer asked Bloom if he needed anything else, he replied, "A form of ID would have been helpful to validate."

Edwards then asked for an apology. Bloom continued to speak with the officer.

The officer asked if pool cards are handed out to all residents.

"Yeah, they kind of make their way around," Bloom said. "But that's good enough for me today."

Edwards again asked Bloom to apologize. He did not.

On Thursday afternoon the Glenridge Homeowners Association issued an apology and announced that Bloom had resigned his position as the pool's chairman and board member.

"The pool chair escalated a situation in a way that does not reflect the inclusive values Glenridge seeks to uphold as a community," the association wrote in its statement.

His company, Sonoco, also issued a statement. The statement did not mention him by name but said that he is no longer employed with the company.

Bloom's attorney told the Winston-Salem Journal that Bloom had approached Edwards after a female pool member asked him whether Edwards was a member. After Edwards became angry because he asked for ID, the attorney said, Bloom called police "to make sure that the interaction didn't escalate."

This is one of several alleged racial profiling incidents in recent weeks. A white woman who became known online as "#PermitPatty" resigned from her job after a video went viral of her calling police on an 8-year-old black girl selling water, and last week a 12-year-old black boy had police called on him while he was mowing grass.