Three teens and an adult detained by plainclothes Park Police officers at the National Mall for selling water. (Photo via Twitter)

The three teens handcuffed for illegally vending at the National Mall last Thursday have scored summer employment.

Raymond Bell, the founder of the HOPE Project, was one of thousands to see the photos that went viral last week, depicting African American teens in handcuffs for selling water by Jefferson Drive SW, as plainclothes Park Police officers searched them. Tour guide Tim Krepp took the pictures and posted them to Twitter.

According to Park Police spokesperson Anna Rose, four males—three teens and one adult—were detained by officers for illegally vending. While the adult was released after officers determined he wasn’t associated with the vending, the three juveniles were released to the custody of their guardians with a verbal warning.

None of them were cited or arrested, but the photos sparked outrage. “I was bothered by the image, but it has become so common,” says Bell. “I got on social media and it took me 10 minutes to find one of their parents.”

His organization has provided technical and information technology training to local young adults since 2009. Two of the teens started working with the HOPE Project on Sunday, and the third began on Wednesday. He says it was easy to get in touch because one of the mothers had already corresponded with him more than a year ago to inquire about the program.

Normally, the HOPE Project program is for high school graduates, but Bell wants to provide the so-called “Water Boys” with a structured environment this summer. He says he’ll pay them D.C. minimum wage (which’ll be $12.50 an hour starting July 1). He says The HOPE Project is the perfect fit for the young men because “this is what we do anyway.”

The teens, who live in Maryland, had originally planned to work at Six Flags, but they weren’t given job offers. Selling water on the Mall was a fallback plan.

“I really want them to leave with a technical certification,” Bell says, along with training in how to replace iPhone and laptop screens. “I want to really fuel their entrepreneurial ambitions. They’re going back to high school in the fall, but I want them to leave with a credential, with some skills that could be an income generator.”

Bell says that the real conversation is about empowering local teenagers. “There’s not enough opportunity out there for young kids,” he says.

“I just want to thank the guy who took the picture,” one of the teens told WJLA. “Without him, none of these opportunities would have been possible.”

Bell’s is not the only possibility that’s come their way. Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen says that he’s received a number of offers for the teens from people all over the country.

This came after Allen, the chair of the council’s committee on the judiciary and public safety, wrote a letter to Park Police Chief Robert MacLean requesting a review of the incident.

“I can’t help but think how the reaction by these same officers might have varied if different children had set up a quaint hand-painted lemonade stand on the same spot,” the letter says. “While still the same violation of selling a beverage without proper permits and licenses, I doubt we would have seen little girls in pigtails handcuffed on the ground … I don’t believe the image of young African-American men handcuffed on the ground for selling bottled water is a reflection of my city.”

Allen says he received a call from MacLean over the weekend to discuss the incident.

“I’m not going to pretend everything is resolved, but I get the sense he had a full understanding of how important this was,” says Allen. “He conveyed to me a degree of urgency in that it has had a detrimental impact on the perception of his force.”

He says that MacLean has committed to a review of the incident. We’ve reached out to the Park Police for more information on the review and will update when we hear back.

This issue isn’t that the Park Police were enforcing their rules about vending, Allen says. “It matters greatly how they were enforced … An undercover sting operation that led to three young men in handcuffs on the ground with their pockets searched—that’s not the how.”

D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, who met with MacLean on Wednesday to discuss the incident, agrees. “Chief MacLean said that the Park Police recognize that juveniles’ encounters with police have long and lasting impacts on their lives,” she said in a statement. “I stressed to him that verbal warnings should be used whenever possible, particularly for first-time offenders, who may not be aware of the prohibition on vending.”

Updated with comment from Eleanor Holmes Norton.