Breaking: joking around or near the NYPD now illegal.
In this scene, a cyclist gets ticketed for riding his bike on a Brooklyn sidewalk. A few neighbors rib the cyclist, the situation escalates, and one neighbor gets arrested for harassment, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest.
An officer in the van took issue with this particular bystander, telling him to “mind your own business.” “I wasn’t even talking to you!” the boisterous witness responded. And with that, the officers hopped out of the van and approached, demanding, “give me some I.D.!” “Get your hands out of my face,” the bystander responded. “I’m gonna issue you a summons right now,” the officer continued. “A summons for what?” the bystander demanded to know. A call for backup is made, and the witness recording the scene remarks “the NYPD is crazy.”
What would we do if they didn’t get these criminals off the street?
For the whole ridiculous story, go to NYC The Blog.
Remember that guy who was accosted and then arrested by a bunch of hyped-up TSA employees at the Albuquerque airport in 2009? Despite being well within his rights to not show ID and film the airport’s public areas, the group of swarming TSAers and law enforcement were having none of it. Phil Mocek was causing a “commotion” (even though he was completely calm), and the authorities weren’t going to let a little thing like real laws get in their way.
Officer: This is a federal checkpoint. You can’t do it [film] here.
Mocek: I’ve checked into it and I know that I can do it here.
Officer: Well, you can be arrested, then you can check into it more.
Nice! Arrest first, check laws later.
Last week, Mocek was acquitted on all four charges, including failure to obey an officer and concealing his identity.
Source: KOB.com
UPDATE: The president of the Seattle Police Officer’s Guild has reviewed the footage and determined the officer’s actions were justified considering the situation.
Seattle PD will do what it takes to bring jaywalkers to justice — even if it means punching one out and instigating an assault investigation.
Ah, the joys of cell phone cameras.
Last week I wrote about a confrontation between myself and the LAPD while legally photographing a crime scene where a man had been killed. During the encounter LAPD officers berated, bullied and threatened me with unlawful arrest for supposedly obstructing their investigation. At no point did I encroach on the crime scene, or cross police tape to photograph the incident. I was well within my legal rights granted to me by the US Constitution and LAPD’s Media Relations Handbook.
Photo by Mike Anzaldi
In regards to freelance photojournalist Mike Anzaldi’s brush with the law earlier this week: Yes, he has recovered all the photos the Chicago Police Department erased from his memory card.
While journalists don’t always have their rights, they do have technology.
Photo via discarted
Do photographers interfere with police work — taking photos from a distance?
The Cape Town police in South Africa would say yes; photographer Mlandeli Puzi would probably disagree. The off-duty photographer, who normally works for the newspaper Cape Argus, was arrested over the weekend for taking photos of a police raid on a tavern in Delft South. They charged him with resisting arrest and obstructing police from performing their duties.
Puzi’s friend, who was at the scene, said:
“The officer just grabbed his camera and shoved him inside the van; we couldn’t understand why.”
A police spokesman said:
“No one is allowed in the operation area beside police and the parties concerned, and failure to comply will result in arrest.”
Puzi is expected to appear in court today.
Article via Cape Times.
boywithgrenade.org 