How, by asking him to identify himself, and holding him in the cop car for five minutes while they figured out who he was? In most states the law requires all citizens to present ID to LEO upon request. The jerk with the camera showed up to deliberately create an opportunity to make a YouTube presence for himself, that's all.
Also, how does anyone know the camera guy was black? When he was whining about his poor wrists being in handcuffs, they looked pretty white to me.
If you have committed no crime and there is no credible suspicion of an crime or that you have committed a crime or are about to commit a crime, then you do not have to identify yourself if you are just walking on the street. Now if you are driving in your car then it is legal to demand a drivers license.
There are only 12 stop and identify states, which are states in which when there is a suspicion based on specific and articulable facts, then a suspect has to identify him or herself.
Now in other states there mostly is not such a demand but if you don't want to identify then you have to keep your trap shut because if you lie and make up a fraudulent name/identity then you are screwed because you may not have to identify yourself, but you are not allowed to lie about it. Lying about your identity is a crime.
In the Netherlands (and yes, I know that is not the USA in case some, not you DiAnna but some other posters who in the past have made comments about this) everybody above the age of 14 must be able to show an identity card/passport. But this does not mean that an officer can walk up to you in the street (while you are doing nothing suspicious or potentially a witness) and demand identification.
But if you are in a small crowd outside of a fire where the police suspects foul play, they can ask the crowd to identify to make sure the suspect might not be hiding in the crowd.
And the police cannot just take information from this identity card and let it become public knowledge. All institutes/law enforcement officers/etc. can just use your information to identify. They cannot take information from that card unless there is a specific need for it and that information when collected immediately falls under the privacy laws. That means that information cannot be accessible by those that do not have legal permission to do so and failure to protect that information from your ID card can lead to prosecution and heavy fines.
For example if my employer takes a copy of my ID card (the Dutch version of the IRS demands this to make sure someone is legal to work) and he puts it in a system that anybody with a 14 year old computer skill can hack into and steal this copy of the passport/ID card then the employer will get prosecuted for their violating the right to privacy laws of the Netherlands.
Usually the police is not that fussy about ID cards, if you do not have one with you but you have other means of identifying (like your bankcard/student card/drivers license then the police will/may not fine you for not having an ID. I have even seen cases in which the person was just around the corner from his house and just forgot his wallet, then he can call home and ask someone to bring his papers and that is also fine. In the Netherlands ID laws are not there for generating income, just for identifying.
If you cannot or are unwilling to identify yourself you will be taken to the police station where they ascertain your identity, as soon as that is done and that person is not wanted or has not committed other offenses, they will get a fine and sent home.
In the US I can understand people's reluctance to identify. Often I have heard that the information is then put in a police system and then you are known to the police. In the Netherlands the police do not go around voluntarily asking people for their ID and then making a record of it that is logged in police files.
www.foxnews.com
en.wikipedia.org
saputo.law