‘Butt,’ officer!
Cop-a-feel search ‘fetish’: lawsuit
A Harlem man claims that an NYPD officer has a “fetish” for violating body cavities in random searches — and that a departmental tweet boasting about the cop proves his case.
John Hidalgo, 48, says in a Manhattan federal lawsuit that he was at his local bodega buying candy for his daughter last September when an “Officer Febres” from the 23rd Precinct approached him about a “bulge” under his shirt.
Hidalgo tried to show the officer that it was his phone, but he was shoved into the bodega shelves and inappropriately touched by the cop, he claims. The officer also put his finger up his rectum, the suit alleges.
“I felt anger and rage because I couldn’t do nothing,” Hidalgo told The Post. “I feel like less of a man. I feel like I was raped or something.”
What’s more, Hidalgo claims the officer was the same cop named by the NYPD on Twitter last October in a post suggesting he was willing to go “where the sun don’t shine” to do his job.
“Carrying your #marijuana stash where the sun don’t shine won’t keep Officer Febres from finding it. That’s dedication. #itswhatwedo,” the NYPD’s 23rd Precinct tweeted last year, showing an officer identified as Febres at a desk with two bags of weed.
The tweet prompted jokes and outrage.
Hidalgo now claims it was that same Officer Febres who violated him and gave him a ticket, which has since been dismissed.
Hidalgo’s lawyer, Gregory Antollino, said his client admits he shouted at the cop during the episode, but was provoked by the officer putting his finger up Hidalgo’s butt.
“The complaint will be reviewed,” a city Law Department spokesman said.