The New York state attorney general sued the city police department, NYPD, on Thursday, accusing the largest police force in the United States of using “brutal” force during a Black Lives Matter protest last year.
Letitia James said New York police officers unreasonably arrested peaceful protesters, illegally detained legal observers and used batons and pepper spray “indiscriminately and unjustifiably.”
James, a Democrat, added that the actions “resulted in significant injuries and violated people’s basic right to peaceful protest.”
Tens of thousands of people marched in New York last May and June as part of protests across the country following the death of African-American George Floyd suffocated by a white Minneapolis cop.
The NYPD was criticized for its disproportionate response, with several videos circulating on social media in which police officers charge at peaceful protesters and deploy the controversial crowd control tactic called “kettling” (a form of rounding up protesters) .
“There is no question that the NYPD used excessive, brutal and illegal force against peaceful protesters,” James added in a statement.
In her complaint, the civil prosecutor calls for an external auditor to be appointed to review police tactics in future protests.
The lawsuit filed in Manhattan also accuses Commissioner Dermot Shea, the head of the Department, Terence Monahan and Mayor Bill de Blasio, who as head of the local government is effectively their boss.
De Blasio defended the actions of the police at the time, while promising a review of the alleged abuses and the application of penalties if necessary.
Looting on the margins of the protest prompted the mayor to impose a night curfew for a week.
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