Tag Archives: NYPD

Tomorrow at noon there will be a protest at Mayor Bloomberg’s Upper East Side home over the NYPD’s practice of falsely arresting gay men for prostitution at the city’s adult bookstores. Duncan Osbourne at Gay City News has been following this story for months; I first mentioned his coverage here in late October. Basically, the cops are sending hot young …

The NYPD is asking for federal permission to disrupt cell phone service in NYC in the event of another terrorist attack, citing the use of mobile devices to coordinate last year’s bombings in Mumbai. A draft copy of [NYPD Chief] Kelly’s statement to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security says the NYPD believes the Mumbai attacks could be a model …

Room Eight, the NYC politics site founded by Politico’s Ben Smith, reported this weekend on a federal lawsuit filed against the NYPD regarding their refusal to grant press credentials to online journalists. “The system of granting press credentials in New York City has run amok and needs to be changed immediately,” said Norman Siegel, a prominent civil rights attorney who …

Duncan Osbourne at Gay City News reports on the NYPD’s entrapment of gay men patronizing NYC’s adult bookstores. One example of how their trap works: Robert Pinter was looking for a DVD and perhaps a good time when he visited Blue Door Video on First Avenue in the East Village. He was approached by an attractive young Asian-American man. “He …

There was trouble during NYC’s Critical Mass this weekend too. Via Gawker, watch a cop totally bodyslam a rider to the ground as the ride passes through Times Square. The rider was initially charged with resisting arrest and assaulting an officer for “aiming” his bike at the cop. But we’re in the YouTube era and the video seems to tell …

The NYPD is considering equipping all cops with Tasers. However: Four days before a consultant suggested the NYPD expand its use of Tasers, the country’s biggest stun gun manufacturer was hit with a $6 million verdict for the death of a California man. A federal jury found that Arizona-based Taser International should have better warned Salinas, Calif., police that the …

In a case that has riveted NYC for the last 17 months, today three NYC detectives were acquitted in the shooting death of Sean Bell, a black Queens man who was fired at 50 times after undercover officers claimed they thought he was going for a gun. No gun was ever found. Three detectives were found not guilty Friday morning …

Charges were largely dropped this week against former Philadelphia CBS anchor Alycia Lane in her traffic altercation case in which she allegedly called a female NYPD officer a “fucking dyke” and struck her in the face. Lane was fired from her TV job after the incident. The original police complaint against Lane said the female officer suffered lacerations and swelling …

In one of the largest raids in NYC history, today the NYPD conducted a massive sweep of Chinatown’s bustling counterfeit designer goods shops, clearing Canal Street of knockoff watches and handbags. Police padlocked 32 businesses whose owners now face stiff fines or imprisonment. Mayor Bloomberg: “It is organized crime, frequently accompanied by bloody turf wars, stickups and armed assaults. Counterfeiters …

The NYPD is conducting a subway sting called “Operation Lucky Bag” in which undercover cops plant bags and wallets containing credit cards,, then wait around to see who picks them up. Unlucky Samaritans who pick up the bags with the intent on contacting their owners are detained, frisked, and their criminal backgrounds are checked. If I found a wallet on …

Yesterday the activist group Radical Homosexual Agenda staged a protest at City Hall during the speech of openly lesbian City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, claiming that Quinn was the “civilian agent” of a new NYPD policy that subjects to arrest the members of any group of 49 persons or more that gathers without an approved NYPD permit. Activists claim this …