Attorney:
False arrests of protesters a 'symptom of institutional suppression' of speech
and protest by NYPD.
By
Lauren McCauley |
In
a clear rebuke of the heavy-handed tactics of the New York Police Department,
the City of New York on Tuesday agreed to pay $583,000 in damages for the false
arrest of more than a dozen Occupy Wall Street demonstrators on New Years Eve
in 2011.
The
protesters were arrested near midnight in Manhattan for allegedly blocking
pedestrian traffic after marching from a rally in Zuccotti Park. However,
according to the suit, Peat v. City of New York, the police had surrounded the
marchers and prevented them for dispersing.
Hailing
the settlement as an affirmation of the constitutional right to protest,
attorneys with the civil rights law firm Stecklow Cohen & Thompson, who
argued on behalf of the protesters, said: “This systematic false arrest and
misconduct by high ranking NYPD officers is a symptom of an institutional
practice of chilling expressive speech activity and suppressing protest in New
York City.”
“The
police, led by supervising officers, stopped peaceful protesters on the
sidewalk, surrounded them with a blue wall of police, told them to disperse,
and then arrested them before they possibly could,” Attorney Wylie Stecklow
continued. “This was an unacceptable violation of basic constitutional rights
perpetrated by the Bloomberg-Kelly NYPD.”
Marking
the largest single settlement to date for an OWS-related civil rights suit in
New York, the plaintiffs will each receive between $5,000 and $20,000 in
compensatory damages.
“I’m
glad we were able to stand up for our rights and show the NYPD that the law
applies to them, as well,” said Garrett O’Connor, who was one those arrested.
“Now I hope there will be an investigation into the police tactics used against
the Occupy Wall Street movement.”
This
video documents the New Years march and arrests: