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Street Protests, D.C. Meetings
Congressional Forum Here As this newspaper went to press May 12, those Congressmen, House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers Jr. of Michigan and Manhattan Rep. Jerrold Nadler, were holding a community forum on the case in lower Manhattan. Queens Supreme Court Justice Arthur J. Cooperman on April 25 acquitted the three Detectives charged in the fatal shooting of Mr. Bell - Gescard Isnora, Michael Oliver and Marc Cooper - 18 months ago outside a Queens club after Mr. Bell and his friends while leaving his bachelor party got into a loud argument with a stranger. His verdict pivoted on the conclusion that Detective Isnora - based on his grand jury testimony and the accounts of others - had heard a friend of Mr. Bell's, Joseph Guzman, threaten to get a gun to settle the argument, leading the Detective to try to confront Mr. Bell and Mr. Guzman when they reached their car. Mr. Bell's family and their advisers, including the Reverend Al Sharpton, were unhappy with that ruling and asked the U.S. Justice Department to pursue Federal civil rights charges against the three Detectives. Besides criticizing Justice Cooperman - who previously was best known for convicting two cops for torturing a small-time marijuana dealer with a stun gun inside the 106th Precinct stationhouse in 1986 - they have also questioned the manner in which the Queens District Attorney's Office handled the case, focusing particularly on its decision to have the three cops' grand-jury testimony read into the trial record. Spared Them From Grillings This allowed the Detectives' version of events to be heard by the judge without their being subject to cross-examination. It was the fierce and ultimately successful cross-examination by the cops' lawyers of key prosecution witnesses - most notably Mr. Guzman and the other man in the car with Mr. Bell, Trent Benefield - that led Justice Cooperman to question their credibility.
He said that desire was not a reflection on the undercover cops - including Detective Isnora - who said they had abided by the NYPD mandate that they could drink on duty to blend into a situation but could have no more than two drinks. "Alcohol had to be involved for them to carry out their undercover mission," Governor Paterson noted. NYPD Already Testing The NYPD last September issued a directive requiring that all officers involved in a shooting in which another person is struck must take a Breathalyzer test. That order, which Detectives Endowment Association President Michael J. Palladino said has been implemented in "a handful of cases," is being challenged in Federal court in separate lawsuits - one brought by the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, the other by the DEA and other unions representing superior officers in the NYPD.
"They're trying to correct a problem that doesn't exist," Mr. Palladino said during a May 9 phone interview. "Everybody who's tested so far has blown a zero," meaning there were no traces of alcohol found. He said he had declined an invitation to testify at Monday's Congressional hearing downtown, noting that he had commitments to be in Washington, D.C. for National Police Week, including his role as a top officer of the National Association of Police Organizations. Giving Feds 'All the Facts' Detective Palladino made the trip to the nation's capital last week to meet with Congressmen Conyers and Nadler - who chairs the House Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties - because "I thought it was important for them to know all the facts of the case and what went on in the courtroom, not the distorted version that's been given to them by Al Sharpton or that appeared in some of the newspapers."
"My impression," the DEA leader said, "was that they were not surprised by the verdict based on the law." He presented transcripts of the trial to the staffs of both Congressmen. Traffic Blocked, 219 Arrested While those meetings were taking place, supporters of the Bell family blocked traffic at six locations near bridges and tunnels connecting Manhattan to New Jersey, The Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens in acts of civil disobedience meant to keep the public focused on the case. Under a prior arrangement with the NYPD, protesters volunteered to be arrested, with 219 of them being taken into custody at several locations, receiving desk appearance tickets when they were booked, and then being released. At the press conference the day after with the Governor, Reverend Sharpton characterized it as "a motorist-driven protest" meant to dramatize that all Mr. Bell had been trying to do at the time of the fatal confrontation was to drive home from his bachelor party. He did not mention that an autopsy result showed he had a blood-alcohol level that was nearly twice the standard for being considered legally intoxicated. The protests were peaceful but fueled by angry rhetoric. At the biggest one, which began outside Police Headquarters and moved west onto Centre St., forcing cops to close the Brooklyn Bridge to vehicle traffic for an hour late Wednesday afternoon, some of the more-militant protesters chanted, "We at war! Guilty!" After a police van filled with female protesters who volunteered to be arrested pulled away a bit after 5 p.m., a louder, more-intense chant of "Sean Bell! Murderers!" was taken up by a segment of those who remained from the several thousand protesters. Among those who were voluntarily arrested were Reverend Sharpton; Ms. Paultre-Bell; Mr. Guzman, who wore a white Yankee cap and a T-shirt containing excerpts of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, and Mr. Benefield, who wore a T-shirt bearing the inscription "50 shots," referring to the number fired by cops that fateful night. Few Elected, Union Officials Although the crowd was fairly large, there was a marked difference in its makeup from the rallies organized by the Reverend Sharpton following the fatal shooting by police of Amadou Diallo nine years ago. Back then, during a series of rallies at Police Plaza prior to the trial that ended in the acquittals of all four cops charged in Mr. Diallo's death, numerous elected officials and union leaders volunteered to be arrested as part of a symbolic protest of the policing policies under then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani. This time, there were no union leaders to be seen in the crowd and just a couple of City Council Members. One of them, Letitia James of Brooklyn, said she would not ask to be arrested, declining to give a reason. "I came here because I wanted to seek justice for Sean Bell," she said. "We're still struggling to get justice for all the black men who have been victims of police brutality." Wants Special Prosecutor She said she would be introducing legislation concerning Breathalyzer tests for cops, the naming of a special prosecutor to handle future cases like this one, and greater transparency in how judges in such cases are selected. The Governor has the power, without legislation needed, to appoint a special prosecutor, something then-Governor Mario Cuomo did following the 1986 Howard Beach death of a black man who was chased to his death on the Belt Parkway by a mob of white teens. Mr. Cuomo tapped Charles J. Hynes (currently the Brooklyn District Attorney) to take over the case from then-Queens DA John Santucci. Council Member James said several aspects of the Queens DA's handling of the Bell case troubled her, particularly its decision to read the three Detectives' grand-jury testimony into the trial record. Only Way to Present Evidence? Detective Palladino, who opposes the appointment of a special prosecutor to handle future police shooting cases because "the current five DAs are capable of prosecuting these cases," said of the inclusion of the grand-jury testimony, "I think the District Attorney's Office was stuck between a rock and a hard place." He noted that there were no civilian witnesses who testified to seeing Detective Oliver fire his gun (he discharged 31 of the 50 shots), and so the grand-jury testimony by the Detectives became the best vehicle for presenting details of the shooting. Governor Paterson during his press conference noted that at one time he had worked in the Queens DA's Office and cited the importance of a close working relationship between prosecutors and the police. That did not necessarily mean, he said, that a DA would pursue cases against cops less aggressively than a special prosecutor who did not have to count on police cooperation in making ordinary criminal cases. Reserves Judgment And so, pressed on whether it was advisable to appoint a special prosecutor, he replied, "Not in all of them." He said that the Bell family was seeking the civil rights prosecutions and supporting the civil disobedience because "the other redress opportunities of society had failed them." Mr. Paterson said he had pointed out to them the criminal conviction several years ago of a police officer for fatally shooting Ousmane Zongo, an immigrant who fled during a police raid even though he was not a target of that raid. "I would like to believe," the Governor said, "we're in a different time period" from the era in which police officers were routinely exonerated at trial even when evidence strongly suggested they had not been justified in killing black men and sometimes youths. Speaking of the demonstrations the day before, the Governor said that while he could not support illegal conduct that he wanted to "commend the advocates ... for participating in civil disobedience in a way that made their point without any excess activity." 'By Definition an Inconvenience' Whatever traffic problems were caused, he continued, "The process of civil disobedience by its nature ... inconveniences others." Among those who attended the meeting a week prior to the street protests where Reverend Sharpton laid out his plans was United Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten. "It was a very angry meeting, but it was a lot of people talking about issues that have nothing to do with the Sean Bell case," she said during a May 5 phone interview. Ms. Weingarten had been invited to attend that meeting by Reverend Sharpton, and did so because "I have a lot of black and Hispanic members who come to me with concerns about their children. There is still racial profiling that goes on. There is a need to have this incident paid attention to. At the end of the day, the question for people is, can an innocent person, or a person who is perceived to be innocent, walk down the street and be safe, whether from a criminal or from police?" |
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