Upper West Side Democrat Gale Brewer sent a letter to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly yesterday in support of Council Member Jumaane Williams, who was handcuffed at last month’s West Indian Day Parade, but she also notes that he’s not alone. “I have had my own experience with a belligerent and over-reactive office, and this incident, along with that of Council Member Williams, the pepper spraying of non-violent protesters near Union Square, and other incidents in the recent past suggests that an attitude of unwarranted belligerence has emerged among officers assigned to work with crowds,” Brewer writes. She goes on to describe an unpleasant run-in at the Gay Pride Parade in June in which her Council ID could not stop an officer (who she does not name) from adopting a “belligerent attitude, hooking his thumbs in his belt, puffing up his chest, and acting as though he felt he was under threat.” Brewer says that the cop went on to grab and push an African-American woman. The councilwoman writes that maybe she “should have spoken up earlier,” but concludes that “some officers seem to believe that they can act as they please with little restraint and no accountability.” Our imagined Ray Kelly caricature might respond simply, “You talkin’ to me?”
Second Council Member Alleges NYPD Mistreatment [Runnin Scared/VV]
