Award-winning documentary filmmaker and Charlotte-based journalist Steve Crump was visiting Charleston, South Carolina on Oct. 8 to report on the local cleanup efforts in the wake of Hurricane Matthew. He was walking to his news van when he was verbally accosted by a white man sitting on the sidewalk and who had pulled out his iPad to film Crump.
The man, 21-year-old Virginia resident Brian Eybers, referred to Crump as both a "slave" and a "n*****." He was arrested for disorderly conduct and possession of drug paraphernalia, the Charlotte Observer reported Tuesday and will face his first court hearing Friday morning. The event unfolded just 10 blocks away from the Mother Emanuel AME Church, the house of worship where Dylann Roof gunned down nine black churchgoers in June 2015.
In an interview with the Washington Post published Friday morning, Crump said he could hear Eybers "narrating... into the tablet" and confronted him about what he heard.
"He basically said, 'There's a black guy here. No, wait a minute, he's a slave. No wait a minute, he's a 'n-word,'" Crump told the Post. "I went from 0 to 60 in an instant, just like that. I just turned to [my cameraman] and said, "We need to get this guy on tape.'"
You can watch the exchange, which has graphic language, embedded above.
In the video, Crump confronts Eybers and asks him to confirm that he "called me in the n-word, right?" Eybers says, "I believe I did call you the n-word."
Crump tweeted Friday morning that he's "back in Charleston and off to court this morning to face Mr. Eybers."
