After Maurice Hawkins, 44, of Baltimore saw news footage that featured his stepson Allen Bullock, 18, smashing up a police car, he convinced Bullock to turn himself in. Bullock has been charged with eight criminal counts and is being held on $500,000 bail.
Hawkins said he warned Bullock that if he didn’t turn himself in, police would “find him, knock down our door and beat him.” In Hawkins’s estimation the police “are making an example of him.”
From The Guardian:
“As parents we wanted Allen to do the right thing,” said Bobbi Smallwood, Bullock’s mother, who wept and dabbed her eyes. “He was dead wrong and he does need to be punished. But he wasn’t leading this riot. He hasn’t got that much power.”
“It is just so much money,” Smallwood, 43, said of the bail sum of $500,000. “Who could afford to pay that?” Hawkins said the total exceeded the bonds placed on some accused murderers in Baltimore.
4 of the officers facing felony charges in the death of Freddie Gray posted $350,000 bail. 2 of the officers posted $250,000 bail for misdemeanors in Freddie Gray’s death while in police custody. Allen Bullock, an 18 year old, who arguably committed a crime by smashing up a police vehicle, who was made accountable by his mother and stepfather to do the right thing and turn himself in, is expected to post $500,000?!? Wow – one man’s life is worth less than a parked car. No wonder we saw so much rage and destruction.