SHOCKING: Racial slur led to fight with Gov. Quinn’s head of Security

Blackburn College senior Bryan Reynolds, 22, says Governor Quinn’s head of security used racial slurs prior to a bar fight in Carlinville, IL last month.

CARLINVILLE • The politically connected head of Gov. Pat Quinn’s Southern Illinois security detail used a racial slur against a black college student in a Carlinville bar, starting a fight that preceded the officer’s resignation, the student says.

Blackburn College senior Bryan Reynolds, 22, said in an interview that the epithet from state Trooper Ken Snider “started the … well, I wouldn’t call it a ‘brawl,’ but I guess the fight.”

Reynolds’ account of the St. Patrick’s Day fight in the small community south of Springfield raises new issues around Snider’s sudden resignation the next day. Snider, one of Quinn’s top security people and a well-connected member of the region’s Democratic power structure, resigned shortly after what officials have described as a barroom “altercation.”

Reynolds makes shocking claims that State Trooper Ken Snider also called him the “n-word”..

Reynolds, a former football player, told the Post-Dispatch that he stood near Snider inside the Anchor Inn. After two bumps to his shoulder, Reynolds turned to the state trooper and “asked what his problem was, because that’s the second time he bumped into me,” Reynolds said.

Snider grabbed the student’s shoulder and called him “the N-word” and other derogatory names, Reynolds said.

When Reynolds attempted to remove Snider’s hand from his shoulder, the trooper responded with a shove, Reynolds said, which provoked him to throw a punch.

For full story: STLToday.com.