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Entries from Gothamist tagged with 'cops'

September 18, 2008

A dominatrix at the Rapture S&M parlor in TriBeCa allegedly offered a "prostate massage" to an undercover cop for $200, leading to her arrest Monday night on prostitution charges. The 21-year-old pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct and was conditionally released. The owner of the club, Staten Island's Collin Reeve, was also arrested and charged with promoting prostitution. His lawyer tells the Daily News that "the NYPD does not know the difference between prostitution and freedom......

Continue Reading "Vice Cops Shut Down TriBeCa Dungeon"

September 11, 2008

New York cops were less trigger happy in 2007 than 2006, according to the NYPD's annual firearms discharge report. In fact, last year police fired the fewest number of times since the department started keeping track in the '70s. In 2007 there were 111 incidents in which police discharged their firearms, including shots fired at animals, in suicide attempts, accidents and at suspects. (That number was down from 127 in 2006 and 253 in 1998.)......

Continue Reading "Police Fired Fewer Bullets in '07"

August 26, 2008

35-year-old Marlon Smith, who was allegedly beaten, pistol whipped and maced by two off-duty female cops during a road rage incident in the Bronx on August 15th, says he's suing the city for $25 million. According to a witness, the altercation was sparked when Kollen Robinson, 24, and Michelle Anglin, 37, yelled at Smith to close his car door so they could pass by in Robinson's SUV. An exchange of insults quickly became physical, with......

Continue Reading "Man Beaten By Off-Duty Cops Seeking $25 Million"

August 19, 2008

Two female NYPD cops did some serious damage to a Bronx man early Friday night, allegedly pistol whipping him during a road rage incident. Michelle Anglin, 37, and Koleen Robinson, 24, were off-duty when they became enraged at 35-year-old Marlon Smith for leaving the driver’s door of his Suburban open, almost scraping Robinson's SUV, the Daily News reports. F bombs and A bombs were promptly fired at Smith by the cops. When he responded with......

Continue Reading "Two Cops Charged with Gang Assault in Bronx"

August 19, 2008

WCBS wants you to be alarmed, at least if you live in a “sleepy New Jersey town” like the ones Bergen County, where local police are using Homeland Security grants to assemble a stockpile of sweet machine guns, particularly the totally bad-ass Heckler & Koch UMP (pictured). Reactions among sleepy locals range from "It's a waste of our tax money," to “I think if they think they need them, then it is good that they......

Continue Reading "Suburban New Jersey Cops Get Machine Guns"

July 11, 2008

Two members of the NYPD's Organized Crime Control Bureau were relieved of their badges after videotape of a raid on a downtown club made its way to the Internal Affairs Bureau. According to the Post, in one segment, a veteran sergeant is seen bending down over an open cash register (some money was reportedly stolen). His supervisor was taped urinating in the establishment's kitchen sink. One of their OCCB co-workers, a detective, was suspended earlier......

Continue Reading "Organized Crime Cops Busted for Corruption, Etc."

June 12, 2008

Photo courtesy Clinton Hill Blog. It’s a common complaint from cyclists that the NYPD doesn’t seem too interested in ticketing the myriad drivers who use the city’s bike lanes as a double-parking lot. (My Bike Lane is dedicated to the phenomenon.) And it’s not uncommon to see a cop car idling in a bike lane while the officer does a little shopping. But this is getting ridiculous: A Clinton Hill blog reader reports that the......

Continue Reading "Misleading by Example: Cops Love Bike Lane Parking"

May 30, 2008

A gang of five trailed a pair of off-duty cops in Washington Heights around midnight last night and jumped them in an attempted robbery that did not go well. Things went sideways for the assailants almost immediately when one of them initiated the attack by picking up a wooden folding chair from the trash and hitting one of the officers on the back of the head with it. The approach has been known to work......

Continue Reading "Two Off-Duty Cops Jumped in Washington Heights"

April 24, 2008

Starting today, teams of six NYPD officers will be patrolling the subway system in 12 hour shifts to thwart would-be terrorists. You’ll be able to easily identify the squads – called “Torch Teams” – by their rifles, MP5 submachine guns, handguns, body armor and bomb-sniffing dogs. The program is being paid for with $151 million from taxpayers nationwide, allocated through D.C. The Torch Teams will function like the similarly equipped NYPD “Hercules Teams” (pictured) above......

Continue Reading "New Subway Cops Armed to the Teeth to 'Fight Terror'"

April 19, 2008

Photos from MyFOX News Police patrolling the East River near the United Nations as part of increased security linked to Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the General Assembly diverted their attentions momentarily to rescue a beaver who seemed to be in distress. Cops noticed that the animal, which was four feet long and weighed 40 pounds, seemed to be laboring in the strong currents of the East River and was swimming awkwardly. Quick-thinking officers......

Continue Reading "Papal Security Detail Rescues Beaver from East River"

April 18, 2008

Earlier in the week, unconfirmed reports of a knife-wielding assailant had Williamsburg residents on edge; South Williamsburg in particular has been flooded with patrolmen all week, and we’ve heard from readers who say they’ve been written summons for minor offenses like jaywalking. Though the 90th Precinct and the NYPD press liaison are unforthcoming about the dragnet, two officers walking their beat by the future Pies ‘n’ Thighs location on Driggs and South 4th Street told......

Continue Reading "Machetes and Knives Out in Williamsburg"

April 11, 2008

The serial sexual predator, who had been arrested 52 times (29 were for sexual offenses) and was arrested for a 53rd time on Wednesday after sexually assaulting a woman on the 6 train, was eligible to be legally institutionalized. However, a State Supreme Court Judge decided to parole him. The state's attorney general argued for institutionalization under a new law to keep uncontrollable sex offenders off the streets. But Judge William Wetzel compromised by setting......

Continue Reading "Judge Decided to Let Subway Perv Prey On It"

March 25, 2008

The Justice Department is denying federal benefits to the families of the two auxiliary police officers who were brutally killed by a marauding gunman in the West Village last year. Yevgeniy Marshalik's and Nicholas Pekearo's families each applied for $300,000 in benefits, part of the 2003 “Hometown Heroes” Congressional bill for families of first-responders killed in the line of duty. But the DOJ doesn't think they qualify, because NYC's “auxiliary police are not recognized as......

Continue Reading "Families of Auxiliary Cops Slain in West Village Rampage Denied Federal Benefits"

March 15, 2008

Surveillance video shows that two rookie police officers were not patrolling a Brooklyn housing complex where a 30-year-old woman was raped in a stairwell last week. The two officers were disciplined for lying about doing their jobs, when in fact they were not. The victim of the assault was trailed from the subway by a man she recognized from the neighborhood and he followed her into her building's elevator. After producing a knife as she......

Continue Reading "Cops Were Slacking as Woman Got Raped"

March 4, 2008

Two white Staten Island cops were indicted today for an incident last Halloween in which they allegedly handcuffed a black egg-throwing teen and drove him to a dark, secluded marshland he was stranded (the handcuffs were taken off). Initially, the cops were also accused of stripping him down to his shorts and kicking him. The officers, Thomas Elliassen and Richard Danese, who are pleading not guilty, said they just wanted to "scare him" and later......

Continue Reading "SI Cops Indicted in Halloween Teen Abduction"

January 28, 2008

Although Rev. Al Sharpton appeared with officer Christopher Ridley's family after the Mt. Vernon cop's death, advising people not to rush to judgment, questions about the shooting are turning in the direction of race and societal divisions. The Friday night shooting occurred when Ridley, off-duty police officer, tried to stop a fight and Westchester police shot at him. White Plains is less than 20 miles from the South Bronx and about five miles west of......

Continue Reading "Race Mentioned as an Issue in Mt. Vernon Cop Killing"

January 27, 2008

On Friday night, the Westchester police shot at a Mount Vernon police officer brandishing a gun in front of a county social services building. The policeman killed was Christopher Ridley, who was off-duty at the time; now it turns out he had been trying to break up a brawl. County lawmaker George Oros explained the gunfire erupted after Ridley got up from the ground with something in his hand outdrawn (he was 100 feet away.)......

Continue Reading "Cop-on-Cop Killing in Westchester"

January 23, 2008

An ongoing investigation of corruption and illegal practices in the Brooklyn South Narcotics Unit could jeopardize dozens, if not hundreds, of successful prosecutions of drug dealers. The possibility has arisen days after a sergeant and a detective were arrested for paying an informant with drugs and cash that they themselves had robbed from the addict. Another sergeant in the unit was also arrested for using NYPD resources to investigate the vehicle IDs of a drug......

Continue Reading "Narc Cops Corruption Probe Imperils Drug Cases"

January 20, 2008

Two sergeants and a detective were arrested Friday after one was caught on tape providing information on surveillance vehicles to a drug dealer and the other two were caught supplying drugs and cash that they'd stolen from a supposed junkie and then returning it in exchange for information. Sgt. Roosevelt Green was a 12-year-veteran of the NYPD working out of the 62nd Precinct in Brooklyn, who was using a police laptop to run license plate......

Continue Reading "Bad Cops Traffic in Drugs, in League With Dealer"

December 24, 2007

The man who allegedly shot and killed Carol Simon-Hayes last week, as she was walking towards her nine-year-old son and talking to a friend on the phone, has been arrested. Darius Dubarry was arrested at a motel in Augusta, Georgia, where the 27-year-old fled town after Simon-Hayes's death. Simon-Hayes was killed in Crown Heights when an argument between Dubarry and another man devolved to gunplay, and Simon was struck by a stray bullet. “I got......

Continue Reading "Suspect in Carol Simon Killing Arrested"

December 19, 2007

The NYPD detectives working the homicide investigation of Carol Simon have identified a suspect in her killing, although they are not publicizing his identity. Simon was shot as she was returning to her car where her son was waiting for her at a gas station. The killing occurred Saturday evening in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn, as an argument between two men turned violent and one of the men pulled a gun. Neighbors and......

Continue Reading "Cops ID Carol Simon's Killer, No Arrest Yet"

December 5, 2007

Operation Lucky Bag, the NYPD program that threatened to ensnare good Samaritans along with subway thieves, is making a comeback after being effectively shut down earlier this year. Initially, the program involved cops leaving bags of merchandise, wallets, or purses on subway benches. When someone picked them up and didn't immediately turn them over to the police or subway personnel, he or she was arrested. According to the police, Operation Lucky Bag netted 101 arrests......

Continue Reading "Operation Lucky Bag is Back!"

December 1, 2007

The Hershey candy company is under fire for producing a breath mint candy that police say is hard to distinguish from an illegal drug. Philadelphia cops are complaining that a new iteration of Hershey's Ice Breakers product looks a lot like crack cocaine. When we initially read a quote from a local Philadelphia news station––"Even veteran narcotics officers acknowledged that they could not tell the difference between a package of crack cocaine and the breath......

Continue Reading "Cops: Hershey's Mints Are Crack Cocaine-y"

November 18, 2007

The New York Times examines the practice of handcuffing prisoners who have been shot by the police, just a few days after the death of Khiel Coppin. The mentally disturbed Brooklyn 18-year-old was handcuffed by cops after they shot him ten times, thinking he was armed with a gun. It turns out, Coppin was armed only with a hairbrush. According to the Times, the practice of handcuffing someone who is already prone and wounded is......

Continue Reading "Cuffing the Shot and Wounded"

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