19th century policing in the 21st century


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