Fatal chopper crash probed City, NYPD sued over protest abuse
New Yorkers who say they were abused by cops during the George Floyd protests last summer filed a class-action lawsuit against the NYPD and the city.
The suit — which follows a similar one filed by State Attorney General Letitia James last week — calls for monetary damages for the 10 victims named in the case, as well as for other potential victims who can join the group.
“The New York Police Department repeatedly corralled protestors into spaces where they could not escape. They beat protestors with batons, sprayed them with pepper spray, and arrested them without lawful justification, all without fair warning,” wrote lawyers in the complaint filed in Manhattan Federal Court on Thursday.
“They then physically restrained them with flex-cuffs in such a manner that many reported serious, long-term nerve damage. Protestors were subjected to lengthy and unnecessary arrest processing that put them in dangerously close quarters, all in the height of the global COVID-19 pandemic.”
The suit laid out a series of allegations of cops abusing their authority, dating from May 28 through June 6. The defendants include the NYPD’s top brass as well as Mayor de Blasio.
One named plaintiff in the lawsuit, David Jaklevic, 41, was body slammed by an officer during a May 30 protest near Union Square, even while he was trying to leave the protest, according to the suit. He was then arrested.
When he told an officer that the flex-cuffs they put on him were too tight, an officer responded, “Shut the f—k up and sit down,” according to the suit.
Another protester, Barbara Ross, 57, claimed in the suit that she was riding her bike on June 1 as part of a protest on 59th St. in Manhattan when a female NYPD officer opened the door of a police van and grabbed Ross’s handlebar, causing her to fall and fracture her foot in two places. Ross was not arrested and walked home on a broken foot, the suit claims.
“We think it’s high time that the police department and the city of New York be held to account for this misconduct,” said lawyer Jonathan Moore, who represents the plaintiffs in the case.
The NYPD did not immediately respond to a request for comment.