What ever happened to?......

[sabbat hunter]

The NYPD cops in various major cases in which they were charged with criminal activity against a civilian

Anthony Baez case. Anthony was killed with an illegal choke hold by Officer Francis Livoti. Livoti was charged with criminally negligent homicide but acquitted. Livoti had federal charges brought up against him and was convicted and sentenced to 7.5 years in jail. During a departmental hearing he was found to have violated guidelines by using an illegal choke and was fired. City paid out a $3million dollar suit to Baez's family.

Amadou Diallo case: Officers Carroll, Murphy, McMellon, Boss fired 31 bullets into diallo. Acquitted by upstate jury. No federal charges. Internal investigation found that officers did not violate any guidelines, but all were put on restricted desk duty (not allowed to possess gun). Carroll retired, Murphy and McMellon became firefighters, Boss still is on the NYPD on desk duty.


Abner Louima: Officers Bellomo, Schwarz, Volpe, Bruder, Wiese charged with sexually brutalizing Louima by federal government. Volpe pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 30 years in jail. Schwarz was convicted of perjury and served 5 years in jail. Bruder and Wiese were found guilty of obstruction of justice, overturned on appel. Bellomo was acquitted. All but Bellomo were fired. city paid a $8.75 million suit to Louima.

Tim Stansbury: Officer Neri fatally shot Tim as he walked across the roof of a brooklyn housing project. Grand jury declined to indict Neri, who claimed he fired accidentally. No federal charges.
Was suspended 30 days after departmental trial then assigned desk duty (no gun allowed). City paid out $2million wrongful death suit.

So in 4 major cases only one were the cops acquitted in a jury trial (by an upstate ny jury), the Diallo case.
In one case the grand jury in NYC failed to indict.


Why am I bringing this up? Because people have said that on other threads that when cops commit crimes the get off scott free most of the time. I believe I have shown otherwise.

Also it shows that NYPD officers who violate civilian rights by committing violence against them or even killing them is fairly rare and when they do, they pay the price (see louima case and Baez case for perfect examples of this)

So I see no systemic issue in the NYPD that people claim is there, nor any inherent racism. In every it was a case of the officers being reckless at best (Stansbury case), sociopaths in the worst cases( louima case the officer who actually committed the horrendous crimes (sodomy with the plunger, criminal brutalization, etc) plead guilty and is in jail for 30 years.

[angstlessk]

1. Sorry, the REAL story speaks for itself, it does not need your propaganda..

http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0210,nelson,32846,1.html

Four paragraphs from that great article:

The decision by the Court of Appeals on February 28 overturning the convictions of NYPD officers Charles Schwarz, Thomas Bruder, and Thomas Wiese for their involvement in the torture of Abner Louima ironically reminded us on the last day of Black History Month of centuries of oppression and judicial injustice. With this decision, the only officer incarcerated for Louima's brutal torture and sodomy with a broken broomstick is former officer Justin Volpe, sentenced to 30 years in December 1999.

<snip>

Whether or not we choose to recognize it, we live in a cityscape that has for decades been littered with the dead bodies of citizens killed by the police under questionable circumstances. Thirteen-year-old Nicholas Heyward Jr. was killed in 1994 by police as he played cops and robbers with his friends in the housing complex where he lived. Anthony Baez, 29, was killed that same year by an illegal police chokehold in the Bronx after his football accidentally hit a patrol car. Hilton Vega, 21, and Anthony Rosario, 18, were killed in the Bronx in 1995 while lying facedown on the floor. Yong Xin Huang, a 16-year-old Brooklyn honor student, was shot in the head by a police officer in 1995. And the list goes on, back to Dred Scott and beyond.

The only police officer serving time for any of these killings is Francis X. Livoti, Baez's killer. Livoti's eventual conviction, after charges were first dismissed because of bungling by the Bronx D.A. and after acquittal by a judge in a nonjury trial, was a direct result of sustained pressure by the Baez family and a broad coalition of activists. Federal authorities finally indicted Livoti for violating Baez's civil rights, leading to a 1998 conviction and a seven-and-a-half-year sentence.

Not much time for the taking of a life, but it beats no time, the usual in these cases. Most of those killed or brutalized by the police in the United States are young, black, Latino, or Asian. In the face of the inability of the criminal justice system to successfully prosecute police, it's impossible to deny the perceived worthlessness of these lives. As attorney Alton Maddox said nearly two decades ago, "The criminal justice system in New York State will deal with you more harshly if you kill a dog than a black man."

[lame54]

2. they work for the Bush administration

[sabbat hunter]

10. who works for the * administration? n/t

[NNN0LHI]

3. Chicago police were torturing black men into confessing to crimes they would be executed for

This went on for decades. After the truth came out there was not one arrest over it. The ringleader Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge who learned his torture tricks while serving in Vietnam is currently collecting his government retirement pension and living in Florida.

Don

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=t&ie=UTF-8&rls=HPIA,HPIA:2006-34,HPIA:en&q=Jon+Burge

http://bushplanet.blogspot.com/2006/07/torture-in-chicago-torture-in-iraq.html

Mayor Daley was Involved

Does Chicago (America) have a mayor who is hiding his involvement in the cover-up of the systematic torture by Chicago Police of almost 200 African American citizens? Why if there are 200 hundred reported cases of torture with evidence has there not been one prosecution?

The states attorney decides what cases to prosecute. Mayor Richard Daley was the States Attorney during the reported torture and he was informed of the torture and evidence of torture. Mayor Richard M. Daley did nothing.

[catnhatnh]

4. 16.75 million in civil settlements? Smallest settlement 2 million?

All you've shown is that when the case makes the newspapers the city is fucked.In the 2 million dollar suit (the "cheap" one) the chief perpetrator received a 30 day suspension? The latest case of course,was a firefight with an unarmed party with 50 shots fired and one officer stopping to reload and became an acquittal? From your evidence it is far safer to lead Al Queada than to be a US citizen in New York City with an "excess" of melanin.

[sabbat hunter]

6. Those are...

4 cases over 10 years.

Do horrific things happen to innocent civilians in NYC by the NYPD, yes they do. But in a city of 8.1 million people, 28% of which are black (so about 2.3 million) to have 4 cases is minuscule, not a widespread problem, nor any indication of widespread racism. (not to mention the fact that 2 of the 3 officers in the trial were black as well).

Should it be zero civilians harmed, of course, but this is not a perfect society because humans are not perfect.

Is the prison system full of hispanics and blacks because of racism or because they tend to come from lower socio-economic classes? How many violent felons in the US prison system come from the middle or upper class?

Generally when one is from the middle class and up (of all races), they are less likely to commit violent crimes, be members of gangs, etc.

What actually needs to be done is to find a way to help those of the lower socio-economic rungs to move up and improve their situations. Improving education system in the inner cities, smaller class sizes, making it cheaper to go to college, etc.

I live in one of the most ethnically diverse areas of NYC in astoria/Long island city. But I also live in one of the safest, why? Because it is a middle income area, where there are good schools, the kids are encouraged to go to college, they work hard. In many cases they go to school during the day, help out their parents in a store or restaurant in the evenings.

NYPD cops have one of the hardest jobs in the country, and 99% of them do a fantastic job keeping the streets of the city safe.

the officer that fired 31 shots should have been found guilty of reckless endangerment, why the judge found them all not guilty I do not know.

[ColbertWatcher]

5. Check this link...

...Bad Cop News.com

[sabbat hunter]

12. your point is?

[ColbertWatcher]

14. It's a link.

The point is, if you click it, you can visit another web page.

[sabbat hunter]

15. well duh

but what was your point of posting that link.

[ColbertWatcher]

16. You asked what happened to a bad cop...

...so I posted a link to a bad cop online database.

They help people keep track of bad cops after the headlines.

[defendandprotect]

7. Volpe, I think, is still in prison . . .

One of the side bits of info on that abuse of Abner Louima with a plunger was that Volpe
had been seen in the back parking lot of the police dept sucking up cocaine from the dashboard.

This is a purposeful abuse of people of color --- and we're next --- across the US ---\
and the drug war also helps to demoralize and corrupt police enforcement and our elected officials.

Drug War can't exist without that cooperation -- !!!

[sabbat hunter]

8. volpe was sentenced

to 30 years in jail, with no possibility of parole. He will be there for a long time.

[defendandprotect]

9. it's really sad that someone was so harmed by him . . .and how he harmed himself . . .

doing the dirty work for those who want to keep this brutal police enforcement going.

No matter where you look in our society, every effort has been made over the past 30 + years to

create violence, increase preceptions of violence in society -- especially via TV/movies ---

[sabbat hunter]

11. I am more surprised

that a sociopath like Volpe made it thru the police psychological testing than anything else. I would have thought that a sicko like that would have been picked up on some sort of test along the line.

[defendandprotect]

18. No -- the point is this is who they are looking for . . .

At the time of the coup on JFK, the Dallas police department was 50% KKK . . .
At the time of the coup on RFK, the LA police department was 50% John Birchers . . .

Post all of the overt 1960's political assassinations, we have seen a rapid increase in the
brutality of our police enforcement ---

We seem to still have racial profiling of drivers by our police here in NJ --
at least every time I check it is someone of color pulled over.

And, look where we are now with attacks on protesters --- and penning them in!!

It used to be about police beating someone up ---
now it is about the most vicious attacks --- the most vile and brutal attacks.

Also keep in mind there was a recent story about the military asking questions of the national
guard as to whether they would take guns from their relatives/friends if necessary?
I can't quote you the story exactly, but it was posted here within the last two months at DU,
as I recall.

[Brewman_Jax]

13. All of the above victims

were black or hispanic, i.e. people of color. No evidence of racism, or are those cases just a coincidence, too?

[Richard Steele]

17. You believe you've shown otherwise? Please re-read your own post.

Looks to me like several of the examples you cite
feature cops who got off pretty free.