On Sept. 6th at about midnight, RAVEN Amarillo returned from having coffee to Polk Street to witness to the kids leaving teen night at La Chateau bar. We had been there from 8:00 PM to about 10:15 PM and led one young man to the Lord. It had been a good evening. Upon arriving there were about 150+ teens in the parking lot at 7th and Polk were screaming and shouting, on the verge of fighting. The noise was intense. As soon as we pulled up across the street the mass of bodies moved into the intersection completely blocking it. Then the fighting began. It started small and grew worse very quickly. The noise grew louder as the fighting escalated and some of the kids went about randomly hitting people in the back of the crowd.

I called the police and could barely hear the dispatcher as I told them to send someone quick as there was a riot in progress. I then set up a wireless loudspeaker on the hood of our truck and began shouting at the kids to disperse as the police were on the way. Very few stopped fighting. Some opened their trunks and started throwing alcohol inside. The crowd then moved into the parking lot and spread out. The fighting was all over the lot and one teen was on the ground near a vehicle being stomped on by multiple assailants. The crowd then moved to the far north side of the lot near the back.

My son, Russell, was videotaping the riot from outside the main crowd but had to keep moving to stay out of the way. At some point my son was punched from behind in the side of the head and was knocked to the ground. He got up immediately (he was not hurt) and turned the camera back on. At this point the police arrived and the first car turned on its siren and teens started fleeing in all directions. You can hear the siren right at the end of this segment. We had been warning the parents, the kids, and the La Chateau bar owner all summer that something like this would happen.

I used to attend teen clubs in the 70″s and it always turned out this way. No one would supervise the masses of teens and at some point violence would break out that was sparked by a group of troublemakers that these events inevitably attract. Illegal alcohol and/or drugs get mixed in and violence explodes. Teens are still just kids and need adult supervision and have no business being exposed to the bar scene that many adults are not mature enough to handle. There is no excuse for parents to expose their children to this evil, for bar owners to profit from it, or for the city to issue permits that encourage this stupidity.

In the end, the parking lot was littered with a half dozen shirts ripped off in the melee, empty beer cans, liquor bottles, and lost glasses. A few teens were arrested and one was treated by EMS for an injury to his face. But this could have been worse if weapons had been involved. Next time, we might not be so fortunate.

I also want to correct the poor job of reporting by Amarillo Globe News. I (David Grisham) was not assaulted and I was not in the midst of this fight. I was on the phone and the loudspeaker across the street and I saw it all from a broad overview. My son was videotaping and was assaulted. Two other RAVEN members went into the crowd and broke up some of the fighting kids. Amarillo Globe News never even contacted me before they wrote the poorly written story.

This incident is an embarrassment to the city of Amarillo. We need to stop letting teens go to real bars and pretend to be something they’re not…adults.

THIS VIDEO IS A DOCUMENTARY AND IS FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY.

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