(CN) — Two New York City lawmakers sued police on Monday, saying officers wielded bicycles as a weapon against them, with pepper spray to boot, during a Black Lives Matter protest last year in Brooklyn.
Five days after a Minneapolis police officer murdered George Floyd in a scene that would quickly spread across the globe, Assemblywoman Diana Richardson and state Senator Zellnor Myrie joined protesters who hit the streets of Brooklyn to demand justice.
As members of the Black community and also elected officials who hold professional working relationships with the police, Richardson and Myrie said they believed they could help keep maintain peace in demonstrations they believed were necessary in response to the latest examples of brutality against Black Americans.
And though they said the protest was a peaceful one, the lawmakers say the violence they endured from police on May 29 showed they were not immune.
“The experience was a painful and humiliating reminder that following the rules and complying with police orders does not protect Black Americans from police brutality, not even Black Americans who have ascended to elected office,” according to the complaint in Brooklyn.
Richardson and Myrie had even reached out to Chief of Police Jeffrey Maddrey, who was commanding officer at Barclays Center where the protest was being held, to inform him of their attendance. They say Maddrey offered to be on hand if they needed anything.
In their extended efforts to be identifiable to police by attending the protest Myrie notes that he wore a neon green shirt with his name on it, and Richardson had her name on a face mask.
The lawmakers say no prior curfew had been announced but, shortly before 8 p.m., police said they were shutting the protest down and began to trap the crowd using a tactic called kettling. Without warning, according to the complaint, officers began to slam their bicycles into protesters, hitting Richardson, Myrie and others several times in the abdomen, back and legs.
Both Black lawmakers were then pepper-sprayed directly in the face, and Myrie was allegedly dragged away by police, arrested and handcuffed with zip ties. He was released only after he was recognized.
“As she was being attacked by the police, Assemblywoman Richardson heard her colleague Senator Myrie screaming her name, with terror and fear in his voice, the way you never want anyone to scream your name,” the 58-page complaint says.
The suit seeks a court order for the city police to do an overhaul of its tactics to prevent kettling and using bicycles as battering tools from occurring in the future.
As a further example of disparate treatment, the suit notes how violently police responded to their peaceful Black Lives Matter protest while offering little resistance against white protesters who breached the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 in a bid to overthrow the federal government.
“The conduct of the NYPD on May 29 reinforced another ugly truth — one that the January 6, 2021 riots in the Capitol made crystal clear: that police treat speech as threatening not because of how protestors behave, but because of who they are and what they are protesting,” the lawsuit states.
The New York City Police Department has faced heavy criticism for its actions against protesters last summer, and an investigation in December found that many officers violated protesters' rights.
Nick Paolucci, a representative with the city Law Department, promised Monday to review Myrie and Richardson's claims.
“The NYPD has a longstanding track record of successfully protecting the right of the public to protest while ensuring public safety, and is committed to strengthening those efforts,” Paolucci said in a statement.
To date, more than 400 individual protesters have filed claims, and New York Attorney General Letitia James also sued the city back in January for its tactics/
Filed in the Eastern District of New York, the suit also names Mayor Bill de Blasio, NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea, NYPD Chief of Department Rodney Harrison and six individual officers.
In a joint statement, Myrie explained why joined the protests.
“I felt I had an obligation to try to mediate and keep the peace between citizens and the police, given the large police presence and the intensity of the community’s pain,” said Myrie in a statement. “Yet instead of being given a chance to mediate as a peacemaker, I too became a victim of violence by the police department.”
Richardson added that injustices against the Black community have been happening for far too long.
“I will not allow yet another incidence of excessive force against Black Americans by police officers to be swept under the rug,” Richardson said. "I have the ability and the obligation to hold the police who violated my constitutional rights accountable."
Richardson and Myrie are represented by Sean Hecker with the Kapler Hecker and Fink law firm.
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