Ramarley cop will bid to save job
AN ARMY VETERAN’S quiet walk with his dog in a Brooklyn park turned into a long night in jail on a false arrest — and being subjected to a pro-Trump cop’s racial taunts, a new lawsuit says.
Najja Plowden, 35, was wrapping up a midnight walk with his dog in Crown Heights’ Brower Park last August when two NYPD cops in a police van stopped and questioned him about being in the park after hours.
The park didn’t have any signs posted indicating it was closed, Plowden said, and the cops also didn’t bother a white man who was there playing fetch with his dog.
One of the officers, Nicholas Loweth, allegedly asked Plowden for identification, but he had left it at home. When the cop ran Plowden’s name, an active warrant came up — a 2013 summons for skateboarding in Union Square Park.
After Plowden told Loweth the warrant and summons had been dismissed in Manhattan Criminal Court three months earlier, the officer allegedly asked Plowden if someone could come get his dog because he was going to be arrested for being in the park after dark.
“I explained that (the summons) was cleared up. I wasn’t even in the country at the time,” said Plowden, who filed a lawsuit in Brooklyn Federal Court on Friday.
Plowden — a married father who served in Afghanistan and now works as an occupational therapist for special education students — was taken to the 77th Precinct after the cops dropped off Lily Cat, his pitbull-terrier mix, at his Dean St. home.
While Plowden was in custody, Loweth, who is white, allegedly made disparaging comments to Plowden, an African-American man, that included “your culture is more problematic, more violent, more prone to crime,” and “you wouldn’t have been stopped and detained if you’d been a white guy in a park at night on the Upper East Side,” according to the lawsuit. “I started to tear up because I’m a 35-year-old black man, a veteran, with no criminal record,” Plowden told the Daily News. “I said, ‘Please, do not do this. Why are you doing this?’ “He started to laugh, (and) asked if I was crying. I said, ‘No, this is emotional,’ ” Plowden said. Loweth also allegedly spent much of the night lecturing Plowden with proDonald Trump rhetoric, bragging that the President-elect will support policing in minority neighborhoods and end the “abuse of resources” like food stamps and welfare by “ghetto” residents, the lawsuit says. “Police officers are entitled to their political views, but haranguing a helpless prisoner confined to a precinct cell and subjecting him to racist political bravado is unacceptable,” said Plowden’s attorney Joel Berger.
Loweth — who could not be reached for comment — was a defendant in another federal lawsuit in 2014, in which he was accused of participating in an assault and fabrication of false criminal charges. That case was settled for $25,000.
Hours after his latest arrest, a Brooklyn Criminal Court judge vacated the warrant against Plowden, dismissed the misdemeanor charge and apologized that the NYPD’s computer system had not been updated, according to the lawsuit.
But as a result of the arrest, Plowden’s job as an occupational therapist is in limbo. The Department of Education has declared him ineligible for assignments until it looks into the case, according to the lawsuit.
“I’ve always treated officers with respect,” Plowden said. “I never thought this would ever happen to me.”
A spokesman for the city’s Law Department said the complaint “will be reviewed once we are served.”
The NYPD declined to comment on pending litigation. THE LONG-AWAITED departmental trial of Police Officer Richard Haste for the fatal 2012 shooting of 18-year-old Ramarley Graham begins Tuesday at Police Headquarters.
Haste faces the loss of his job if found guilty at the end of the trial. He remains stripped of his gun and shield on desk duty with full pay.
Graham (photo) was unarmed when Haste shot and killed him Feb. 2, 2012, in front of his grandmother and little brother after Haste chased the teen into his home during a drug bust gone bad.
The NYPD alleges Haste “exercised poor tactical judgment leading up to the discharge of his firearm” and “acted with intent to cause serious physical injury leading to the death” of Graham.
Haste faces penalties ranging from a reprimand to lost vacation days to termination.
Graham’s mother, Constance Malcolm, told the Daily News she met with NYPD lawyers Jan. 9 to press them again for information on the case, and got nowhere.
She said they told her nothing — not even what specific charges he was facing or anything about his prior record as a police officer, citing a state confidentiality law.
“They were hiding behind that,” she said. “That doesn’t make sense because (Mayor) de Blasio talked about transparency.
“Anyone else does something wrong, they put out the charges on them. When it comes to the Police Department, it’s a different ballgame. It’s very frustrating.” A QUEENS music teacher was arrested for sexually abusing a girl while giving her singing and piano lessons at her home when she was 12, police said Monday.
Rafael Diaz, 69, was arrested Saturday and charged with sex abuse and endangering the welfare of a child.
Police said Diaz touched the girl several times four years ago while giving her private lessons. Diaz was music director for the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Parish, where the child was a student.
Diaz was charged with sexual conduct against a child less than 13, sexual abuse in the first degree and acting in a manner injurious to a child under 17. The Diocese of Brooklyn said it contacted the NYPD and Diaz was “terminated upon his arrest.”