A hot dog vendor who had all his earnings seized by a UC Berkeley campus officer was presented with a check for nearly $88,000 raised through public donation.
The September 9 incident, captured on video, saw Officer Sean Aranas take $60 from Rigoberto Matias’s wallet after he failed to produce a permit.
Filmed by alumnus Martin Flores and shared on Facebook, the video received more than 12 million views and was shared more than 36,400 times.
After the incident, Flores visited Matias’s home in San Jose, where he said the vendor’s wife told him one of Matias’s dreams was to own a food truck. A GoFundMe account was started to try to raise that money.
On Saturday, Flores presented Matias with a check at the UC Berkeley Center for Latino Policy Research with hot dogs provided by the street vendor and his family.
Hot dog vendor Rigoberto Matias (center) who had all his earnings seized by a UC Berkeley campus officer was presented with a check for nearly $88,000 raised through public donation
The September 9 incident, captured on video by alumnus Martin Flores (far left), saw Officer Sean Aranas take $60 from Matias’s (second from left) wallet after he failed to produce a permit. On Saturday, Flores presented Matias with a check at the UC Berkeley Center for Latino Policy Research
‘This check is going to be presented to Beto and his family so they can provide for themselves, keep up the business,’ Flores said as he handed an oversized check to Matias with $87,941 written on it.
‘Also keep this movement going. Keep the awareness going in our community…and continue the conversation about justice for street vendors.’
Matias was selling food following a football game on the afternoon of September 9 when Officer Aranas approached him, asked for his ID and took the $60 he had in his wallet.
Aranas then began writing a citation for a lack of permit as Flores filmed the interaction.
‘I felt like a criminal,’ Matias told The Daily Californian.
‘The little money that I made for my family, he took it away from me and made me feel like a criminal.’
University of California Police Department spokesperson Sgt Sabrina Reich said in an email that public employees have a right to due process under the law, adding that the department is currently investigating the incident.
Police also added that cash was seized as evidence.
Flores said he was buying a hot dog from the cart for his kids after a football game when the officer approached. After asking for Juan’s ID, Aranas took the wallet from the vendor’s hands and took out the bills, folding them in his hands (left and right)
Flores then asks Aranas why he’s taking the vendor’s ‘hard earned money’ and notes that people are drinking in public not far away, and that officers should be targeting them instead (left and right). Police said the cash was seized as evidence
Since the citation, a petition to have Aranas fired had received more than 57,000 signatures as of Monday afternoon.
Flores told the Los Angeles Times he was buying a hot dog from the cart for his kids after a football game when the officer approached.
Aranas then allegedly asked for Matias’s ID. As the vendor looked through his wallet, the officer removed it from his hands.
‘That’s when I thought something was not right,’ said Flores, who pulled out his phone to record the incident.
Flores can be heard saying ‘That’s not right’ repeatedly as Aranas pulls bills from the man’s wallet.
Matias (pictured, left, with Flores) said: ‘I felt like a criminal. The little money that I made for my family, he took it away from me and made me feel like a criminal’
He then asks the officer why he’s taking the vendor’s ‘hard earned money’ and notes that people are drinking in public not far away, and that officers should be targeting them instead.
‘Yeah, well he doesn’t have a permit. He doesn’t have a permit,’ Aranas is seen responding. ‘Yep, this is law and order in action…Thank you for your support.’
Flores said he doesn’t think Aranas was wrong in issuing a citation for the vendor’s lack of permit but rather that the officer’s enforcement appeared to be selective.
‘If he’s really about law and order there’s really so many other things he could’ve stopped,’ Flores said.
‘I totally recognize that people have to have permits. But this wasn’t about that. This was about identifying one vendor. If you want law and order, be law and order across the board.’