NYPD Illegally Raids House of Man They Brutalized For Throwing Gay Pride Party, Days Before Court Date (Please Read & Reblog)
A gay Brooklyn man is being targeted and harassed by the NYPD after filing a lawsuit against the officers who raided his home without a warrant and beat him unconscious.
It was early Sunday morning and Jabbar Campbell was hosting a gay pride party when two officers appeared at his house responding to a noise complaint. The officers told the party goers, some who were dressed in drag, to keep it down and left soon after.
10 minutes later, another group of police officers appeared. This time they tried to gain access to the building and began banging on the door with their flashlights.
One officer reached for the building’s surveillance camera (bottom gif.) and turned it towards the wall, blocking the view.
“I noticed them turning the security camera and I got scared,” Cambell said, according to the New York Post.
Campbell opened the door after a few moments only to be ‘bum-rushed’ by the cop. Two officers put Campbell in a shoulder lock while “5 to 7” cops beat him with their fists, flashlights and batons yelling “fag”, “homo” and “asshole” at him until he lost consciousness.
“They said, ‘Stop resisting arrest.’ I said, ‘I am not resisting.’”
But the cops beat him up anyway, he said.
“I blacked out. I was concerned for my life,” said Campbell.
The NYPD then arrested Jabbar and questioned the party goers who witnessed the beating, asking them if they were engaging in “gay orgies” and “screwing each other.” They told the officers they weren’t and they also denied that Campbell was resisting.
Police charged Jabbar with resisting arrest and possession of drugs, allegations that Campbell insists are lies, which must be so because the police later dropped the drug charges after the reported on the story.
The NYPD transported Campbell to Kings County Hospital where he received 9 stitches and was diagnosed with a concussion.
Since then, Campbell filed suit against police, but said more men armed wearing police jackets broke into his home without a warrant and their badges hidden from view just days before his court date. They harassed the guests who were at Jabbar’s house and wouldn’t give their names.
The men in blue allegedly asked if his security cameras were operational.
“I don’t know what they’re looking for, or if they were going to plant something,” Campbell said.
Campbell’s attorney said what happened to his client was a violation of the Fourth Amendment – illegal search and seizure. The NYPD’s Internal Affairs is investigating.
Campbell said he plans to sue the police department and at least nine officers for severe personal injuries.
I was able to get an interview with Jabbar Campbell who admitted to me that he believes the raid was intended to scare and frame him :
Anarcho-Queer: Before your attack, the officers blocked the view of a surveillance camera in front of your building by turning it towards the wall. Taking this into regard, do you believe your attack was premeditated?
Jabbar Campbell: Absolutely, the cops turning the camera, which would have been the best witness if not tampered with, shows ill intent.
AQ: During the attack, the NYPD yelled homophobic slurs. In your opinion, was the raid was motivated by hate against queer people and/or people of color?
JC: I strongly believe they (Cops) were targeting homosexuals. They were trying to portray me as some sort of disorderly, arm-flailing, drug influenced crazy homosexual. I also believe that they (Cops) didn’t expect so much brains inside of a dark skinned man in that neighborhood.
AQ: How many officers were involved in your attack?
JC: About 5-7 cops were beating me, approximately 20+ officers reported to the scene.
AQ: What weapons did the officers use to brutalize you?
JC: Fists, billy clubs, flash lights and things of such nature.
AQ: What physical injuries were sustained?
JC: Multiple injuries to my head, face, neck and back just to name a few.
AQ: After you filed a lawsuit against the NYPD, three police officers raided your home without a warrant and illegally detained your guests. Was this to intimidate you? If so, what message do you think they trying to send?
JC: I definitely think this it was an intimidation tactic and also a plot to frame me just to cover up their crimes. I think the message was that they don’t want people standing up to them.
AQ: What happened during the second raid?
JC: They broke in my home, searched my home and search my friends and colleagues taking their IDs and writing their names down. They had their badges turned around and would [not] give their names.
AQ: Are the officers who brutalized you still on the job?
JC: Yes, however, they are being investigated by IAB (internal affairs bureau) and the ADA.
not safe even in our own homes. ACAB
![occupyallstreets:
NYPD Threaten And Intimidate Activists For For Recording Police
Two West Harlem residents, Christina Gonzalez, 25, and Matthew Swaye, 35, ran into a surprise when they showed up for a community meeting at their local NYPD precinct last week. There, on the wall of the 30th Precinct, were their mug shots—only they weren’t wanted for any crime.
Christina Gonzalez and Matthew Swaye are police reform activists who regularly film police interactions in their neighborhood, especially to record the NYPD’s controversial Stop and Frisk policy. Although filming police is completely legal, the poster (which was full of misspellings, I might add), advised officers to “be aware” that these ”professional agitators” not only film police “performing routine stops,” but also” post the videos on YouTube.
“Subjects purpose is to portray officers in a negative way and to [sic] deter officers from conducting their [sic] responsibilities.” the warning from Sergeant Nicholson reads. “Do not feed into above subjects’ propaganda.”
Gonzalez says it is the NYPD spreading propaganda and that the poster is an obvious tactic to criminalize, intimidate and target her. Since Gonzalez became involved with Occupy and the Stop-and-Frisk movement this fall, police have given her plenty of reasons to look over her shoulder, including calling her out by name and address, erecting a watchtower on her corner and aggressively arresting her sister in front of Gonzalez.
Of course, this is not the first time the NYPD or other police departments have targeted activists. The New York police have a history of infiltrating and intimidating activists, particularly during the Black Panther movement of the 1960s and 1970s.
For activists like Gonzalez, Stop-and-Frisk, a racial profiling tactic, is not only a violation of one’s constitutional rights, it is also part of the NYPD’s larger apparatus of racial oppression. Police stop more than 700,00 people per year, almost 90 percent of whom are young Black and Latino men. The best defense against the illegal searches, which occur during about 50% of stops, has proven to be video, and the ACLU recently launched an app to combat and document unconstitutional stops. But while the movement relies on cameras to expose Stop-and-Frisk, the NYPD targets filmers like Gonzalez with the same type of surveillance and repression police have used against activists in the past.
Gonzalez, who grew up in Far Rockaway, Queens, and graduated magnum cum laude from John Jay College of Criminal Justice last year, has long been familiar with the NYPD—though rarely appreciative of their services. A few years ago, she was a victim of intimate partner violence, and the NYPD routinely refused to help her.
“They blamed me for my own abuse,” Gonzalez said. “The police were supposed to protect me.” Her former partner is currently incarcerated for assaulting his latest girlfriend.
Gonzalez says police are familiar with her and her activism, and that as the movement to reform Stop-and-Frisk grows, so, too, does the police reaction. Gonzalez said that, the more she filmed, demonstrated, and was arrested, the more police noticed her, often calling her by name and making comments like, “we remember you,” or, “be careful walking home; it’s a long walk to 153rd Street.”
“That’s when I said, ‘Okay, they know where we live.’ That was kind of scary, especially to say in front of my little sister.”
In February, Gonzalez learned the NYPD were watching her YouTube page, where she posted videos of police harassment, such as the time officers taunted Gonzalez by telling her that her dreadlocked hair smells. Shortly after she posted the video, two officers called her by name over to their police car.
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