Posted on 07/29/2008 9:36:14 AM PDT by heartwood
A rookie cop - the son of a highly respected New York City detective - has been stripped of his badge and gun after being caught on video viciously attacking a bicyclist who was part of a Times Square demonstration. '
The startling YouTube video shows Officer Patrick Pogan, 22, apparently setting his sights on - and then tackling - a bicyclist as he pedaled along Seventh Avenue as part of last Friday's controversial Critical Mass ride.
Christopher Long, 29, was among a throng of riders as he whizzed toward the corner of West 46th Street at 9:30 p.m. and appeared to try and swerve away from the officer.
But the video shows Pogan pick up his pace as he stares down Long before shoving the cyclist, slamming him to the pavement.
To the dismay of stunned pedestrians, Long, who was not wearing a helmet, hurtles several feet through the air as he flips off the bicycle and lands on the curb.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
You didn't look at THIS video.
The cop walks twenty feet sideways looking right at his target.
What? The guy goes all the way to the edge of the roadway to try to AVOID the cop. The cop picked him out for no apparent reason and assaulted him. There are few things worse than a thug with a badge.
IMO, they won't. Long will sue, and the taxpayers of NYC will pay the bill.
Sorry. This sure looks like the officers were walking to the curb and the bicyclist tried to run down the cop or intimidate him.
Who knows? Maybe what precipitated the interaction was the attempted assault on somebody else?
Why does Bloomburg permit this bicycle anarchy ?
The video clearly shows the cop going after the cyclist, not vice versa. Pogan should be charged with assault (at minimum) and do some jail time himself.
I am with you 100%
A bad cop is lower than a criminal, and good cops who tolerate them become bad cops by definition too
If you ever want to see a very entertaining display of "renegade cops," see if you can get your hands on some of the video footage from the infamous Tompkins Square Park riot in New York City back in the 1980s. I was 100% behind those cops even though they clearly crossed the line from a legal standpoint.
How come there’s on sound?
Sorry, but from what I see on the video, this is completely cut and dried. The line of the cyclist was well to the left of the cop and moving further left. The cop actually increased his speed forward with the obvious intention of intercepting the cyclist.
You've got to try real, real hard to give the cop any room on this one.
Personally, I'd like to see him charged with assualt and placed in the same cell one of us would be in had we performed exactly the same stunt.
Cheers,
Lloyd
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2008/0729081bike1.html
The cops version to the court is really ridiculous. While the bicyclists may be a royal pain, that doesn’t give cops the right to assault. He should be prosecuted.
ok are you nuts?
the cop CLEARLY walked over to TARGET the bicyclist, not the other way around
do you not see the cop leap to the cyclist at the end?
are you a cop protecting another cop?
What had the cyclist done before the take down?
Had he JUST hopped on his bike or had he been riding awhile?
Something triggered the officer to one cyclist of many.
Bound by the rules of the road?
They REFUSE to obey the rules of the road. If he made that turn not only might he have hist someone and lost everything in a civil suit, but he might have gotten the crap beaten out of him as happened in another city to a driver a few days ago when he encountered ‘Critical Mass’
Some of these people are violent thugs.
Maybe he was giving a demonstration in why helmet laws save lives.
Correction: Having said that, you should point out that the cop is a criminal and no better than any other criminal charged with assault in NYC. Any cop that covers for him is also a criminal. Taking away his badge should be only the beginning and this man should do jail time for what was an obvious attempt to injure another human.
period
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