'Central Park Karen' Says She 'Explored All My Options' When It Came To Viral 911 Call
For the first time in a year, Amy Cooper — who became known as the "Central Park Karen" — has spoken out about the May 2020 incident when she called the cops on a Black bird watcher in a moment that has since gone viral.
She appeared on Bari Weiss' "Honestly" podcast and said she felt she had no choice but to call the cops.
The story began when Christian Cooper reportedly asked her to put a leash on her dog in Central Park.
The original video was posted by Christian’s sister Melody on Twitter. In the clip, Christian told the woman not to approach him while she asked the bird-watcher to stop filming.
"I’m going to tell them there’s an African American man threatening my life," Amy said in the video, while Christian invited her to "please call the cops."
Now, Amy has claimed that she was about to put her dog on a leash when Christian allegedly said that if she did not comply, he would do something that she is "not going to like."
"I’m trying to figure out, you know, what does that mean? Is that a physical attack on me? Is that to my dog? Like, what is he about to do?" Amy said on "Honestly."
She claimed that Christian — who was holding a bike helmet in one hand — had pulled out dog treats in the other and was calling her dog over to him.
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"I’m thinking, 'Oh my gosh, is this guy like going to like, lure my dog over and try to like hit him with this bike helmet?'" Amy said on the podcast.
Amy said she realized that Christian was recording her and that he was "standing there, you know, same very physical posture, and suddenly out of him comes this voice from man who’s been very dominant towards me," she said of Christian allegedly suddenly sounding "victimized."
"Like, almost like he’s terrified of me … To me that’s even more terrifying now because you’ve gone from screaming at me — if you kept screaming at me, at least it was consistent, but now his whole verbal demeanor has changed," she claimed.
"I’d explored all my options," she said of the 911 call. "I tried to leave. I tried to look for anyone who’s around. There was no noise, no sound. And it was, you know, it was my last attempt to sort of hope that he would step down and leave me alone."
Following the incident, Amy was charged with one count of falsifying an incident report, but the charges were dropped after she completed five therapy sessions.
Now, Amy said that she had to go into hiding and is fearful about taking her dog outside in case "someone sees me go into a home and realizes it’s where I live."
"So, sometimes I’ll drive him over to a remote field or something just to play with him," she explained.
Amy was also reportedly fired from her job at investment firm Franklin Templeton after the video surfaced online. According to the Daily Mail, she sued the company, alleging that they did not conduct a fair investigation and had falsely portrayed her as racist.
A representative for the film told Fox Business that they "believe the circumstances of the situation speak for themselves and that the Company responded appropriately. We will defend against these baseless claims."
