NY police officer suspended after new video shows brutality
Dozens Arrested at Milwaukee Protest Over Death of Dontre Hamilton
Thousands march against police brutality, many more with signatures
Police Chief Explains Disciplinary Action Against Officers for Excessive Force
Former Buffalo cop caught on video faces sentencing today
NY
police officer suspended after new video shows brutality
(Reuters) - A New York City police officer who
appears to punch a black youth during an arrest that was captured on video and
widely circulated on the Internet has been suspended from duty, the department
said on Friday.
The posting of the footage
follows weeks of protests across the country over recent cases of police
violence toward unarmed black men, including one in which a New York City man
died after an officer placed him in a banned chokehold.
In the eight-minute video
posted on YouTube on Wednesday, a plainclothes white officer can be seen
rushing up to several uniformed officers struggling to handcuff a black youth
and apparently striking him at least twice. Police said the suspect is 16 years
old.
Several bystanders, including
the person filming the altercation, yell at the officer to stop. The footage
then shows a second person, who onlookers tell police is a 12-year-old boy,
being handcuffed.
As the boys are led away to
patrol vehicles, one can be heard asking the officers: "What did we do?
Can I hear what we did?"
The boys were being arrested on
suspicion of assaulting someone and using a cane in the attack, police said.
Police did not say when the
arrests occurred but the person who posted the video footage said they happened
on Wednesday.
Police said that a review by
the Internal Affairs Bureau into the allegations was ongoing.
(Reporting by Laila Kearney;
Additional reporting by Curtis Skinner; Editing by Richard Chang)
Dozens
Arrested at Milwaukee Protest Over Death of Dontre Hamilton
Dozens of protesters were
arrested Friday after causing a three-mile traffic jam by blocking a Wisconsin
freeway over the fatal shooting of a black man by a white police officer
earlier this year, police said. Officials said 74 people were arrested after protesters
stopped traffic on the I-43 in downtown Milwaukee at about 5:15 p.m.
The demonstration follows the
death of Dontre Hamilton, 31, who was shot 14 times by a police officer during
a confrontation at Red Arrow Park in Milwaukee on April 30, according to NBC
station WTMJ. District Attorney John Chisholm this week said the decision on
whether to charge Officer Christopher Manney, who was fired from the Milwaukee
Police Department, would come by the end of the year. Manney fatally shot
Hamilton after responding to a call by workers at a nearby Starbucks
complaining of Hamilton sleeping in the park, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
reported. Hamilton's family said he had a history of mental illness, according
to WTMJ.
Thousands
march against police brutality, many more with signatures
By Brad Knickerbocker, Staff
writer December 13, 2014
Thousands of Americans marched
and rallied in New York, Washington, Boston, San Francisco and other cities
around the country Saturday, voting with their feet against police brutality –
specifically in response to recent police killings in Cleveland, New York, and
Ferguson, Missouri, that have wracked a nation still dealing with issues
involving racial mistrust and mistreatment of black people at the hands of
white police officers.
Family members of those killed
recently – Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Akai Gurley, and John
Crawford – spoke at the “Justice for All” rally in Washington.
"What a sea of
people," said Lesley McSpadden, the mother of Michael Brown, an
18-year-old killed in Ferguson in August. "If they don't see this and make
a change, then I don't know what we got to do."
Eric Garner's mother, Gwen
Carr, called it a "history-making moment."
"It's just so overwhelming
to see all who have come to stand with us today," she said. "I mean,
look at the masses. Black, white, all races, all religions…. We need to stand
like this at all times."
The march in Washington, which
proceeded down Pennsylvania Ave. to the Capitol, was sponsored in part by The
Rev. Al Sharpton's National Action Network, the Urban League, and the NAACP.
While protesters rallied in
Washington, other groups including Ferguson Action conducted similar "Day
of Resistance" movements around the country.
In some locations, protesters
blocked traffic with “die-ins,” and a few arrests were reported. But by the end
of the afternoon there had not been the kind of violence and destruction of
property seen earlier in some cities.
Meanwhile, the activist
organization Change.org reports that so far this year, 622 online petitions
have been started about police violence, which have attracted a total of 1.1
million signatures – considerably more than the 217 petitions in 2013.
Among them: Support for
President Obama’s plan to provide $263 million in federal funding for body
cameras and training for local police departments (192,613 signatures); a call
to fire New York Police Department Officer Daniel Pantaleo, who applied an
apparent chokehold to Eric Garner (95,856 signatures); and a petition to stop
the transfer of military equipment to local police departments (117,003
signatures).
There was a historic sense to
the events Saturday.
"I stand here as a black
man who is afraid of the police, who is afraid of never knowing when my life
might end, never knowing when I might be … gunned down by a vigilante or a
security guard or a police officer,” marcher Ahmad Greene-Hayes in New York
told CNN. “That fear, that trepidation is rooted more so in my connection to my
ancestors … who were enslaved, those who were beaten during the civil rights
movement…. So there's a longstanding history that I'm connected to."
The US Justice Department is
investigating the deaths of Eric Garner and Michael Brown.
"It's important to
recognize as painful as these incidents are, we can't equate what is happening
now to what happened fifty years ago," President Obama said in a televised
interview this week with BET, a network that reaches predominately young
African-Americans. "If you talk to your parents, grandparents, uncles,
they'll tell you that things are better – not good, in some cases, but better….
The reason it's important for us to understand that progress has been made is
that then gives us hope that we can make even more progress.”
Still, Obama said, “This isn't
something that is going to be solved overnight…. This is something that is
deeply rooted in our society. It's deeply rooted in our history.”
Police
Chief Explains Disciplinary Action Against Officers for Excessive Force
CORPUS CHRISTI (Kiii News) -
Two Corpus Christi police officers used excessive force while arresting a
self-confessed killer, according to the findings of an investigation following
the arrest of Sammuel Toomey in September.
Toomey admitted to shooting and
killing three of his neighbors at a Flour Bluff trailer park and severely
injuring a child. Dashcam video released by the Corpus Christi Police
Department shows the two officers as they make the arrest. Toomey was already
in handcuffs when the officers were found to have used excessive force.
Now, Officer Daniel Jimenez, a four-year
veteran, has handed in his resignation in lieu of being fired. Jimenez worked
in the uniform patrol division. Senior Officer Michael Smotherman has been
suspended without pay for his actions. He will have been with the CCPD for
seven years in January.
In a statement released
Wednesday, Police Chief Floyd Simpson said "this was one of the toughest
decisions that I have had to make during my nearly 30 years as a police
officer," and adds that he finds himself "having to defend the civil
rights of a man who, through self admission, killed three defenseless members
of the community. This was a difficult decision. It's one that I had to make.
As a department, we must be accountable to those whom we serve, each and every
day."
Toomey was found dead in his
cell at the Nueces County Jail while awaiting trial. The Nueces County
Sheriff's Department said the 64-year old man strangled himself with his
uniform pants.
LITTLE
SILVER COP CHARGED WITH ASSAULT
A Little Silver police officer
was charged with simple assault Friday following an alleged domestic violence
incident in Sea Bright a day earlier, authorities tell redbankgreen.
Joseph Glynn, Jr., 26, was
issued a summons in his hometown of Middletown for a disorderly persons
violation after the purported victim reported the matter to police there,
according to Charlie Webster, spokesman for the Monmouth County Prosecutor’s
office.
According to the complaint
filed by the victim, whose identity authorities withheld, the incident occurred
as the two were in a vehicle in Sea Bright Thursday evening, Webster said.
It was not immediately clear
how Glynn was notified of the charge, but he reported to the Middletown police
station Friday and was served with the summons, Webster said.
Glynn was not arrested, and the
charge is one that presumes no bail is required, Webster said. No court date
was immediately available.
Wesbter said that in compliance
with state Attorney General rules, Glynn has surrendered his weapon and is on
desk duty in Little Silver pending resolution of the matter.
Last March, former Little
Silver cop Steven Solari, 41, was sentenced to a five-year term in state prison
for assaulting an arrest subject in the borough stationhouse in December, 2009.
The state Department of Corrections website indicates he’s being held at the
Central Reception and Assignment Facility in Trenton.
Former
Buffalo cop caught on video faces sentencing today
A former Buffalo police officer
who pleaded guilty to civil rights violations will be sentenced this morning in
U.S. District Court.
John A. Cirulli, who had been
working in the Northwest District, resigned in May and pleaded guilty in
federal court to two misdemeanor counts of deprivation of rights under color of
law, stemming from the arrest of John T. Willet in April.
A video of that arrest,
recorded on a phone by a bystander, shows Cirulli kicking and slapping the
handcuffed Willet while he was facedown on the sidewalk and yelling for Cirulli
to stop hitting him. Cirulli also hit Willet in the face as Willet sat in a
police car.
Cirulli could face up to two
years in prison.
Meanwhile, Willet pleaded
guilty in May to charges of misdemeanor drug possession and A former Buffalo
police officer who pleaded guilty to civil rights violations will be sentenced
this morning in U.S. District Court.
John A. Cirulli, who had been
working in the Northwest District, resigned in May and pleaded guilty in
federal court to two misdemeanor counts of deprivation of rights under color of
law, stemming from the arrest of John T. Willet in April.
A video of that arrest,
recorded on a phone by a bystander, shows Cirulli kicking and slapping the
handcuffed Willet while he was facedown on the sidewalk and yelling for Cirulli
to stop hitting him. Cirulli also hit Willet in the face as Willet sat in a
police car.
Cirulli could face up to two
years in prison.
Meanwhile, Willet pleaded
guilty in May to charges of misdemeanor drug possession and
