Top NYPD Official Says Cops Don't Need To Worry About Being Criminally Charged For Violating Chokehold Ban

Legal Issues

from the no-law-can-stop-us.-we're-law-enforcement-officers. dept

Surprising exactly no one, an NYPD official has declared NYPD officers to be above the law. In response to the George Floyd killing — a killing carried out by a Minnesota police officer who crushed Floyd’s throat with his knee until no pulse could be detected… and then continued for another three minutes — resulted in the city passing a new law forbidding officers from choking the life out of arrestees. Seems reasonable.

Top brass disagrees. The NYPD’s Chief of Department told officers no stupid law was going to keep them from restraining people to death.

“We can’t be afraid. We’ve got every D.A. come out and say they’re not going to charge that,” Chief Terence Monahan said at a recent CompStat meeting, at which department brass discuss crime trends.

“We can’t be afraid to do what we do. We can’t walk away,” Monahan bellowed at the meeting.

I guess the NYPD is above the law because those above these law enforcement officers are selective about what laws they’ll enforce or against whom. The Chief feels no DA will charge a cop for violating the new law. At least one DA sort of disagrees.

Asked for comment, Manhattan D.A. Cyrus Vance’s spokesman pointed to a statement Vance made on NY1 saying the city law likely won’t survive legal challenges, partly because it’s pre-empted by the state’s chokehold ban, which doesn’t include the city law’s language meant to stop cops from blocking a suspect’s diaphragm.

Here come the conflicts of law to take away the “threat” posed to officers who like to ensure compliance by depriving them of oxygen. I’m sure the laws conflict. That’s what laws tend to do when they’re written quickly in response to incidents that demand an immediate response. But I’m sure Vance feels way more conflicted about the possibility he’ll have to bring charges against NYPD officers — men and women who tend to see him as an ally, rather than a neutral enforcer of laws.

Even the asshole fine gentleman who runs one of New York City’s police unions thinks Chief Monahan’s statement was out of line. But his only complaint is that it wasn’t a memo issued to New York’s finest, giving them a free pass on chokeholds.

Patrick Lynch, the head of the Police Benevolent Association, said Monahan’s belief city prosecutors won’t enforce the city law is misplaced.

“If every DA believes that, they need to say so publicly to the cops on the street,” said Lynch. “Otherwise, we have to assume that we are risking arrest any time we lay hands on a criminal who won’t go quietly.”

It’s amazing that Lynch can still play the victim, presenting the officers he represents as pawns in an unjust system. It appears Lynch believes officers should stay away from anyone they might have to use force to subdue. To do otherwise is to risk criminal charges because there’s apparently no middle ground where officers can effect an arrest without choking someone.

Meanwhile, other NYPD brass are offering up the parade of horribles they believe will be visited upon them by the city’s new law. The trolley car problem presented by the new law says an officer can avoid choking someone or they can choke someone and possibly face criminal charges. But this official says the only choice presented here is arrest or not arrest, with “arrest” directing the city’s law train right across the bodies of officers tied to the tracks of this false dichotomy.

“Their thing is, they’re concerned …. They’re concerned about a bag of crack off the right person, the right dealer, and their knee accidentally, unintentionally going on their back, and then being arrested,” said Manhattan North detective bureau head Deputy Chief Brian McGee.

Come on, Bri. Do you seriously think DAs aren’t going to give officers every possible benefit of a doubt before bringing criminal charges? Do you really think an inadvertent move — corrected quickly — will be viewed as the intentional violation of the chokehold law? This isn’t what’s going to get officers charged. It’s going to be clear, deliberate violations. And even that might not be enough. This is a panic over nothing more than a slight dent in police officers’ autonomy — one that asks they be a little more considerate of the lives in their hands.

Filed Under: chokehold, nypd, prosecutors