A Riverview city councilman has been removed from committee assignments and censured after an altercation in which he called his combatant “a random ass black man who had no fucking business being in our city in the fucking first place.”
The Nov. 4 comment was caught on police body camera footage, The News-Herald reports. Councilmember David Robbins was allegedly drunk and had just crashed his car at 1:40 a.m., leaving the scene on foot and winding up in a nearby Coney Island parking lot.
It was there that he claimed a Black man tried to stab him, but police deemed a folding knife found on the man legal and gave it back.
The alleged fabrication of the assault was previously reported, but Robbins’ comments were not. In addition to saying the man didn’t belong in Riverview, he said: “This riffraff comes into our city. ... They have no business being here.”
Robbins, 34, had been elected to council two days earlier, ousting a longtime incumbent by six votes.
His punishment was approved unanimously by colleagues and criminal charges are working their way through court. Residents and at least one colleague have asked for his resignation.
