The NYPD has already begun to
pay out for the years of overreaching. Claims against the department have
doubled over the past decade.
A Daily News review of lawsuits reveals that 55 officers in the 34,000-person department have been sued 10 or more times during that time period.
Where there's smoke, there's fire? Dick George took photos with his phone, while sitting in his car, of the cops searching three youths. After they were let go, the cops overheard George tell the kids that they should have gotten the policemen's badge numbers. Consequently Mr. George was pulled from his car, his meniscus torn, and arrested for 45 minutes. They also erased his photos. According to George, the cops told him:
Now we’re going to give you what you deserve for meddling in our business and when we finish with you, you can sue the city for $5 million and get rich, we don’t care.
Well, at least they seem aware of their bad behavior. Sadly, they clearly don't give a hoot. While the Bloomberg administration, like its predecessor, usually downplayed any claims, complaints, or lawsuits, the number of those claims doubled over the decade and
cost the taxpayers over $1 billion dollars.
Dick George just settled for $125,000. Maybe that'll rattle their cage?
Ferber and co-defendants Sgt. Patrick Golden and Officer Stacey Robinson have been sued in six other federal cases.
Strike that. No need for them to care at all. That's just some guy and some kids. It's not the craziest abuse of power we've seen right?
The NYPD likes to point out that the number of lawsuits against the NYPD has dropped during Bloomberg's tenure as Mayor. Of course, that's from the mountain of complaints reached under Rudolph Giuliani. This is kind of like saying that old Mike Tyson punching you in the face is not as hard as young Mike Tyson punching you in the face. Why don't you ask this 14-year-old:
The Juvenile Justice Information Exchange reports that Javier Payne suffered cuts to his face, his chest, and a punctured lung from being shoved into the window of the Hookah Shop. Paramedics had to hold Payne’s chest closed as he was rushed to the hospital — though they did not arrive on scene immediately because police called it in with a protocol used for drunks, not for a pediatric emergency.
According to the owner of the shop there was no problem with the kids. The cops got into an argument with the teens, resulting in the officer cuffing and smashing Payne's face through the window. While Payne bled out on the sidewalk (in handcuffs), the officers asked the owner for security footage and whether or not he thought they had done something illegal when they had come into the shop. He said they hadn't.
That's not Ferguson, Missouri, that's New York City.