On July 8, public video showed an undercover Lycoming County detective following 18-year-old Jessie Lopez Jr. through his Williamsport neighborhood, questioning why he was wearing a jacket with his hood up, and later detaining him in handcuffs. Jessie was briefly detained and released.

The Lycoming County District Attorney's Office says its detectives were conducting a gun-violence suppression patrol. It says Jessie committed a pedestrian violation, ignored four instructions to stop, and was detained so officers could identify him. Jessie's father disputes important parts of that account, says the public videos do not support the office's description, and has requested body-camera footage, dash-camera video, dispatch recordings, an accurate outline on a map of the where the pursuit began to where it ended,   and any other available evidence.

Those competing accounts are exactly why the office that employs the detective should not be the only agency reviewing what happened.

This petition is not a personal attack on the detective, and it does not ask the public to decide the legality of the encounter from a short social-media clip. It asks an independent agency to examine whether the initial questioning, order to stop, identification demand, detention, and use of handcuffs complied with Pennsylvania law and county policy—and whether Jessie's race or appearance improperly influenced the decision to escalate the encounter.

The Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office says it does not have direct jurisdiction over local police-misconduct cases unless the matter is referred by a district attorney. That makes Lycoming County District Attorney Tom Marino the official who can open the door to an independent state review.

Sign this petition to demand that DA Tom Marino, within 30 days, refer Jessie Lopez Jr.'s detention to the Pennsylvania Attorney General's Criminal Law Division for independent review.

Marino's office must also:
- preserve and publicly disclose whether any body-camera, vehicle, surveillance, dispatch, or other agency recordings exist;
- release every recording that can lawfully be disclosed;
- publish the policies governing pedestrian stops, identification demands, detention, and handcuffing; and
- release the outside review's findings and any corrective action when the investigation concludes.

Pennsylvania law generally requires requests for law-enforcement audio or video to be submitted within 60 days, but agencies and prosecutors may also choose to release recordings voluntarily. That makes immediate preservation and disclosure essential.

Public safety and civil rights are not competing goals. Lycoming County can protect both by releasing the evidence and allowing an outside agency to review what happened.