Oakland Singer Fantastic Negrito "Put in the Paddywagon," Misses Outside Lands

Oakland Singer Fantastic Negrito "Put in the Paddywagon," Misses Outside Lands

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Oakland blues musician Fantastic Negrito was scheduled to play Outside Lands on Saturday afternoon. But, much to the dissapointment of his fans, he never showed. The singer announced via Twitter that his set was canceled after he was detained by the SFPD.  

As reported by The San Francisco Chronicle and the San Jose Mercury News, the 47-year-old musician was cited for attempting to illegally sell a non-transferable artist wristband on Craigslist. 

Xavier Dphrepaulezz (his real name) told Yahoo Music that he arrived Saturday with his intern, John Beckmeyer, when they “got bumrushed by 10 San Francisco police, all in uniform. They were really aggressive; they handcuffed us, made us get on the ground, all that routine. I’m thinking, 'There’s some sort of mistake, and this will just take a minute to sort out and I’ll be on my way.'"

Beckmeyer confessed that he’d sold an extra artist-only wristband, which had originally belonged to his girlfriend who ultimately could not attend the festival.

Dphrepaulezz was forgiving of the intern (“He is a really good guy. He just made a dumb mistake that affected all of us.), but annoyed with the SFPD: Even though Beckmeyer confessed immediatley, and the police were aware that Dphrepaulezz was due onstage,Dphrepaulezz says they “decided to cut off our wristbands and put us in the paddywagon anyway.” The singer says he and his entourage were detained for three hours (SFPD claims it was 90 minutes), while promoters for the festival canceled his set. 

“The SFPD were kind of assholes," says Dphrepaulezz. "Why did they treat me like an animal, a criminal, when I’d done nothing wrong?”

Dphrepaulezz, who is handicapped in both arms due to injuries sustained in a car accident, also claims that having his hands cuffed behind his back for an extended period of time caused him “severe pain,” but that officers ignored medics’ recommendations to cuff his hands in front of his body instead. 


“Worse things have happened; it’s just a concert. I’m just sad that so many [fans] got let down,” Dphrepaulezz says of his canceled performance. “I’ll do a makeup show on the steps of the police station—a free show for everybody.”

The musician also took to the Kevin Klein show on Live 105 this morning to tell his side of the story. 

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