UPDATE: 3:43 p.m., March 5 –
Brooklyn Borough President, Eric Adams, has spoken out on the viral video of NYPD officers brutally beating a teenage male. “I just had an opportunity to view this video, and I find it completely unacceptable. I will be reaching out to @NYCMayor and @NYPDShea. Every officer involved should be placed on modified assignment pending the outcome of a thorough investigation,” he wrote.
Original story:
The NYPD is notorious for abusing their power, perhaps because they were given the license to do so by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg with his unconstitutional stop and frisk policy. Nonetheless, most recently, NYPD officers brutally beat a Brooklyn teen who was pleading to know what crime he committed. In a video that has been circulating the internet, the teen is seen being confronted by a plain clothes officer, and what should have been a non-aggressive conversation quickly turned violent.
MORE: ‘I Didn’t Want To Be A Hashtag’: Teen Manhandled By Police For ‘Trespassing’ In School Gym
A woman, whose Twitter handle is @TheVelvetRope__, recorded the footage and shared it on social media. While the name of the teen has not yet been confirmed, the woman who recorded the video said that a family friend reached out to her and informed her that the young man’s name is Vincent Carter.
“I’m walking home from work and this undercover cop was holding this man. The guy asked for the cop to identify himself, he ignore that. He asked what crime he commit, he ignore that too. I pulled out my phone. You can hear the guy screaming ‘I never thought it would happen to me,’” she wrote.
**Warning: This video contains graphic contents.**
“I didn’t commit any crime, so can you get off of me?” the teen said to the officer. He then pleaded to be told what crime he committed. “It’s illegal what you’re doing right now. Are you about to pull out a taser?” he said.
The officer told the teen, who was holding his hands up, to stop moving. “What did I do?” the teen asked. “I did not do anything. He saw me in the park and then he came out the park following me,” he continued. “Why are you following me? Can you answer my question?”
“Why are you panicking? You’re pulling out your weapon! I don’t have anything on me,” the teen said. “I just came from the park. What’s the problem?”
The woman who is holding the camera suggested that the teen ask if he is being detained. The teen replied, “He followed me and said, ‘Come over here real quick.’ I’m like, ‘Who are you?’” While still holding his hands up, the teen continued to ask what crime he committed. The officer repeatedly ignored his question and instead, told him to stop moving.
“What crime did I commit? You’re supposed to do that. That’s the law,” the teen told the NYPD officer.
Shortly after, a number of officers are seen running towards the teen. The teen continues to shout that he did not commit a crime and asked the officers to “calm down.”
**Warning: This video contains graphic contents.**
The teen is then swarmed by the NYPD officers, dropped to the ground, kicked and beaten. In the gruesome footage, the teen can be heard screaming at the top of his lungs, while crying out for help.
“Bro, he wasn’t even resisting any sh*t,” the woman recording the incident can be heard saying in the background.
Additional officers approached the scene while the teen is being beaten on the ground, yelling, “Help me!” The teen then pleads for the officers to stop.
Another officer addressed concerned bystanders, asking them to move back. When a woman asked why the NYPD officers “gotta stomp him like that?” the officer replied, “I don’t know.”
The video footage was also shared by criminal defense attorney, Rebecca Kavanagh.
“This content needs a strong trigger warning for police violence,” she wrote. “This young man was stopped by a plainclothes police officer this evening in Canarsie, Brooklyn, apparently for being in a park shortly after the 9PM closing time.”
Kavanagh continued, “Regardless of the reason for the stop (because I am sure NYPD will come up with a reason like a report of a gun) there is no possible justification for this horrific use of violence.”
The woman who recorded the footage provided an alleged update that she received, which said that “anti-crime” NYPD officers from the 69 Precinct in Brooklyn “were patrolling in the vicinity of 100% playground located on Glenwood Road between East 100th Street and East 101 Street,” which is within the confines of the 69th precinct.
“The officers observed two males inside the park smoking a lit marijuana cigarette and as the officers approached the individuals they fled the location. Upon apprehension, one individual was arrested and the second individual was issued a summons,” the update said, adding that the incident is “currently under internal review.”
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