Tuesday marked four years since Ramarley Graham was killed in his own home by members of the New York Police Department. At City Hall, activists, elected officials and the parents of Graham, Eric Garner, Anthony Baez, Shantel Davis and Mohamed Bah called for officers to be held accountable for the deaths of unarmed men.
NEW YORK -- It was still dark in lower Manhattan, a little before 6 a.m. Wednesday, when the parents of Ramarley Graham shook off their sleeping bags and assembled on the steps outside the Department of Justice office of U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara.
A coalition of homelessness advocates and homeless individuals gathered on the steps of City Hall on Monday to call for a “formal investigation and review into the NYPD’s policing and treatment of homeless New Yorkers.”
More than 50 advocacy groups have asked an inspector general to probe how the New York Police Department polices the homeless.
Communities United for Police Reform released a letter sent to NYPD Inspector General Philip Eure on Monday.
“Homeless New Yorkers are entitled to the same rights as any other resident of the city, but some accounts appear to indicate that police have participated in activity violating that notion,” part of the letter states.
The NYPD Inspector General should investigate the policing of homeless New Yorkers, advocacy groups say.
Communities United for Police Reform, Picture the Homeless, and more than 50 other groups wrote to IG Philip Eure requesting the formal probe, saying there are rampant examples of cops unfairly targeting the homeless.
A new series of bills would give police officers the discretion to steer certain low-level broken windows offenses like drinking in public, littering, and public urination to civil court, rather than criminal court.
If the City Council gets its way on a plan to lighten up on some low-level crimes, the city's little-known administrative court system would face a heavy burden.
Attorney General Eric T.
THE BRONX - The family of a Wakefield teenager shot and killed by police in 2012 is continuing their call for justice.
Ramarley Graham was killed in his home by NYPD Officer Richard Haste on Feb. 2, 2012. Graham was 18 at the time.
Surveillance video shows Haste banging on Graham's home after chasing the teen on suspicion of drug possession. He eventually breaks in and fatally shoots Graham in front of family members.
A female undercover NYPD detective “converted” to Islam to spy on Muslim students at Brooklyn College, none of whom were ever accused of a crime. The spying continued for years, long after Mayor de Blasio vowed to end the NYPD's blanket surveillance of the Muslim community.