Just a Little Perjury--Now Move Along

Some 90 percent or so of those arrested at last fall's GOP convention have been found not guilty or seen charges dropped--particularly after homemade videos more than just a bit of exaggeration on the part of the police:

Dennis Kyne put up such a fight at a political protest last summer, the arresting officer recalled, it took four police officers to haul him down the steps of the New York Public Library and across Fifth Avenue.

"We picked him up and we carried him while he squirmed and screamed," the officer, Matthew Wohl, testified in December. "I had one of his legs because he was kicking and refusing to walk on his own."

Accused of inciting a riot and resisting arrest, Mr. Kyne was the first of the 1,806 people arrested in New York last summer during the Republican National Convention to take his case to a jury. But one day after Officer Wohl testified, and before the defense called a single witness, the prosecutor abruptly dropped all charges.

During a recess, the defense had brought new information to the prosecutor. A videotape shot by a documentary filmmaker showed Mr. Kyne agitated but plainly walking under his own power down the library steps, contradicting the vivid account of Officer Wohl, who was nowhere to be seen in the pictures. Nor was the officer seen taking part in the arrests of four other people at the library against whom he signed complaints.

The article also notes that Alexander Dunlop, arrested and accused of participating in a bicycle protest, most likely was doing exactly what he said he was: picking up food for his ill girlfriend (it took him 72 hours to make it home). An police videotape showing him turned out to be edited; the unedited copy supported his version of events.

Sadly, police routinely commit perjury on the stand, and rarely, if ever, get called for it. Projects like I-Witness Video can point out more egregious examples of this, but they are by necessity limited as to where they can film.

Of course, this being the New York Times, "balance" is provided by noting that the police at least didn't get out of control and smash skulls:

Besides offering little support or actually undercutting the prosecution of most of the people arrested, the videotapes also highlight another substantial piece of the historical record: the Police Department's tactics in controlling the demonstrations, parades and rallies of hundreds of thousands of people were largely free of explicit violence.

Throughout the convention week and afterward, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said that the police issued clear warnings about blocking streets or sidewalks, and that officers moved to arrest only those who defied them. In the view of many activists - and of many people who maintain that they were passers-by and were swept into dragnets indiscriminately thrown over large groups - the police strategy appeared to be designed to sweep them off the streets on technical grounds as a show of force.

And, of course, there's always the Officer Koon defense, here provided by a police press officer:

Paul J. Browne, a police spokesman, said that videotapes often do not show the full sequence of events, and that the public should not rush to criticize officers simply because their recollections of events are not consistent with a single videotape. The Manhattan district attorney's office is reviewing the testimony of Officer Wohl at the request of Lewis B. Oliver Jr., the lawyer who represented Mr. Kyne in his arrest at the library.

Or, as Bill Hicks would say, it's all in how you look at the tape: for instance, if you look at it backwards, the police are releasing people and sending them on their way.

As I've noted before, I visited NYC just before the convention--in fact, the biggest protest occurred even as the plane took off (I was watching it on the little television). Yeah, it would've been nice to add my voice, but a week of police presence that reminded me of a Moroccan trip years ago was plenty enough. They were EVERYWHERE and not everyone was a regular, blue uniformed officer with a sidearm. Plenty were in military fatigues and they carried what looked like an M-16.

Don't know about y'all, but that much firepower troubles me--in general. And hearing about exaggerated accounts of the arrests makes me glad I didn't tempt fate, given that calling into work and asking for two or three days more vacation because you're in jail (actually, I think detainees were housed on a pier, but still)--anyway, that's not exactly the best way to secure a merit raise or promotion...although again I'll note with sadness that perjuring yourself appears to be a means of advancement in the New York City Police Department...