SALON

Tuesday, Oct 2, 2012 4:25 PM UTC

NYPD tactics at 2004 RNC ruled illegal

A judge finds mass arrests unconstitutional, exposing the city to lawsuits VIDEO

By

Topics: NYPD, Occupy, Protest, RNC, RNC 2004,

NYPD tactics at 2004 RNC ruled illegal (Credit: (Shutterstock))

A federal judge ruled Monday that the arrest of hundreds of protesters at the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York were improper and unconstitutional. NYPD crowd control tactics were also ruled illegal.

In one incident ruled improper, over 200 antiwar and anti-capitalist demonstrators were kettled by police in lower Manhattan and mass arrested. The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday’s ruling relating to the police response:

City attorneys argued that officers had “group probable cause” to make the arrests, meaning the crowd was acting as one. On Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Richard Sullivan in Manhattan rejected the city’s theory and ruled the arrests on Fulton Street illegal.

“Based on the undisputed facts, and particularly the video of the Fulton Street march and arrests, the court finds that there was not even arguable probable cause to make those arrests,” the judge ruled.

The New York Civil Liberties Union (which first brought the suit) celebrated the judge’s decision. In a statement, executive director Donna Lieberman commented, “This ruling is a victory for the right to protest—a core democratic principle. It places an important check on the abusive policing tactics used to suppress protests during the 2004 RNC.”

The Wall Street Journal noted that the ruling now exposes the city to expensive lawsuits from RNC arrestees. In light of mass arrests and aggressive police tactics in handling Occupy mobilizations, the ruling also sets a precedent for challenging NYPD treatment of protesters.

Watch: Video of a mass arrest at the RNC, August 2004. (Via YouTube)

Continue Reading Close

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

Featured Slide Shows

What To Read Awards: Top 10 Books of 2012 slide show

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 10
  • 10. "The Guardians" by Sarah Manguso: "Though Sarah Manguso’s 'The Guardians' is specifically about losing a dear friend to suicide, she pries open her intelligent heart to describe our strange, sad modern lives. I think about the small resonating moments of Manguso’s narrative every day." -- M. Rebekah Otto, The Rumpus

  • 9. "Beautiful Ruins" by Jess Walter: "'Beautiful Ruins' leads my list because it's set on the coast of Italy in 1962 and Richard Burton makes an entirely convincing cameo appearance. What more could you want?" -- Maureen Corrigan, NPR's "Fresh Air"

  • 8. "Arcadia" by Lauren Groff: "'Arcadia' captures our painful nostalgia for an idyllic past we never really had." -- Ron Charles, Washington Post

  • 7. "Gone Girl" by Gillian Flynn: "When a young wife disappears on the morning of her fifth wedding anniversary, her husband becomes the automatic suspect in this compulsively readable thriller, which is as rich with sardonic humor and social satire as it is unexpected plot twists." -- Marjorie Kehe, Christian Science Monitor

  • 6. "How Should a Person Be" by Sheila Heti: "There was a reason this book was so talked about, and it’s because Heti has tapped into something great." -- Jason Diamond, Vol. 1 Brooklyn

  • 4. TIE "NW" by Zadie Smith and "Far From the Tree" by Andrew Solomon: "Zadie Smith’s 'NW' is going to enter the canon for the sheer audacity of the book’s project." -- Roxane Gay, New York Times "'Far From the Tree' by Andrew Solomon is, to my mind, a life-changing book, one that's capable of overturning long-standing ideas of identity, family and love." -- Laura Miller, Salon

  • 3. "Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk" by Ben Fountain: "'Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk' says a lot about where we are today," says Marjorie Kehe of the Christian Science Monitor. "Pretty much the whole point of that novel," adds Time's Lev Grossman.

  • 2. "Bring Up the Bodies" by Hilary Mantel: "Even more accomplished than the preceding novel in this sequence, 'Wolf Hall,' Mantel's new installment in the fictionalized life of Thomas Cromwell -- master secretary and chief fixer to Henry VIII -- is a high-wire act, a feat of novelistic derring-do." -- Laura Miller, Salon

  • 1. "Behind the Beautiful Forevers" by Katherine Boo: "Like the most remarkable literary nonfiction, it reads with the bite of a novel and opens up a corner of the world that most of us know absolutely nothing about. It stuck with me all year." -- Eric Banks, president of the National Book Critics Circle

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 10

Related Videos

More Related Stories

Comments

 10 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

From Around the Web

Recommendations