SALON

Monday, Sep 24, 2012 9:16 PM UTC

Weird news: Occubaby on the way

A young woman pepper-sprayed by the NYPD fell in love with the volunteer medic who helped her VIDEO

By

Topics: Pepper-spray, Police brutality, Childbirth, Occupy, Police, NYPD, Occupy Wall Street, Occubaby, ,

Weird news: Occubaby on the way Pepper-spray incident gives rise to romance (YouTube still)

It was one of the first videos to highlight police brutality as a central issue in the Occupy narrative. Last September, three young women contained in NYPD orange nets on a New York corner screamed and cried, eyes streaming, as deputy inspector Anthony Bologna seemingly indiscriminately doused them in pepper spray.

Now there’s a story twist begging for inclusion in any Occupy screenplays (no doubt being penned): one of the pepper-sprayed women fell in love with the volunteer street medic who helped her that day, and they are expecting a baby.

As New York Times CityRoom editor Andy Newman reported:

[Kaylee] Dedrick, 26, is expecting a daughter in two weeks with Robert Grodt, 25, said her lawyer, Ronald L. Kuby.

The couple met a year ago today, after Ms. Dedrick, a teacher’s assistant with no history of arrests, was sprayed on the sidewalk on East 12th Street. Mr. Grodt, a volunteer medic, took her into a movie theater and treated her in a utility closet. On New Year’s Eve, he proposed to her in Zuccotti Park.

“Despite her lawyers’ requests,” Mr. Kuby’s release reads, “the couple refuses to name their baby ‘Pepper.’”

As Newman points out, news of Occubaby came in the context of a lawsuit, filed Monday at the Federal District Court in Manhattan, charging Bologna and other officers with brutality and failure to render medical assistance.

Watch the video of the pepper spraying below:

Natasha Lennard is an assistant news editor at Salon, covering non-electoral politics, general news and rabble-rousing. Follow her on Twitter @natashalennard, email nlennard@salon.com. More Natasha Lennard.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • This photo. President Barack Obama has a laugh during the unveiling of the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas, Tx., Thursday. Former first lady Barbara Bush, who candidly admitted this week we've had enough Bushes in the White House, is unamused.
    Reuters/Jason Reed

  • Rescue workers converge Wednesday in Savar, Bangladesh, where the collapse of a garment building killed more than 300. Factory owners had ignored police orders to vacate the work site the day before.
    AP/A.M. Ahad

  • Police gather Wednesday at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to honor campus officer Sean Collier, who was allegedly killed in a shootout with the Boston Marathon bombing suspects last week.
    AP/Elise Amendola

  • Police tape closes the site of a car bomb that targeted the French embassy in Libya Tuesday. The explosion wounded two French guards and caused extensive damage to Tripoli's upscale al-Andalus neighborhood.
    AP/Abdul Majeed Forjani

  • Protestors rage outside the residence of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Sunday following the rape of a 5-year-old girl in New Delhi. The girl was allegedly kidnapped and tortured before being abandoned in a locked room for two days.
    AP/Manish Swarup

  • Clarksville, Mo., residents sit in a life boat Monday after a Mississippi River flooding, the 13th worst on record.
    AP/Jeff Roberson

  • Workers pause Wednesday for a memorial service at the site of the West, Tx., fertilizer plant explosion, which killed 14 people and left a crater more than 90 feet wide.
    AP/The San Antonio Express-News, Tom Reel

  • Aerial footage of the devastation following a 7.0 magnitude earthquake in China's Sichuan province last Saturday. At least 180 people were killed and as many as 11,000 injured in the quake.
    AP/Liu Yinghua

  • On Wednesday, Hazmat-suited federal authorities search a martial arts studio in Tupelo, Miss., once operated by Everett Dutschke, the newest lead in the increasingly twisty ricin case. Last week, President Barack Obama, Sen. Roger Wicker, R.-Miss., and a Mississippi judge were each sent letters laced with the deadly poison.
    AP/Rogelio V. Solis

  • The lighting of Freedom Hall at the George W. Bush Presidential Center Thursday is celebrated with (what else but) red, white and blue fireworks.
    AP/David J. Phillip

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 3 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username ( profile | log out )

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Facebook has been used to find ex-lovers, childhood BFFs or the one who got away. He used it to find the guy who, without his consent, made him his drug mule.
195 points196 points | 19 comments
vote
“This could be a career ender for Michele Bachmann”
123 points124 points | 37 comments
vote
Poll: 3 in 10 voters say “armed revolution might be necessary” - 29% say they believe they'll have to act "in order to protect our liberties" in the next few years
42 points43 points | 16 comments
vote
Capitalism, not feminism, killed home cooking–and fixing our broken food system is gonna take a lot more than some privileged women embracing “new domesticity”
32 points33 points | 19 comments
vote
"New evidence reveals big banks still illegally foreclosing on thousands of homes – and weak settlement allows it."
28 points29 points | comment

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: "The Shelter Cycle": Raised in a cult

Recommendations