The New York Police Department, as part of a court settlement, has agreed to formalize several changes it has made in its crowd control procedures at political demonstrations. The department said it would ensure that protesters will not be trapped inside pens surrounded by police barricades, that people will be given “avenues of escape” when police approach on horseback and that the public is informed about access routes when sidewalks or roads are closed.
The settlement comes from a lawsuit filed in 2003 by the New York Civil Liberties Union on behalf of people who participated in protests that February as the United States prepared to invade Iraq. Plaintiffs included a woman who uses a wheelchair and said she was trapped behind a barricade, a man who said he was blocked by police from entering a protest area, and another man who said he was knocked down by someone else who had been struck by a police horse.
“This is a long overdue recognition by the Police Department that changes need to be made in the policing of large demonstrations,” said Christopher Dunn, associate legal director of the New York Civil Liberties Union.
In the settlement, which was approved by Judge Robert W. Sweet of the United States District Court in Manhattan, the police agreed to formalize the crowd control policies in its written guide for officers. A preliminary injunction issued in June 2004 by Judge Sweet had already ordered the department to abide by similar rules during the 2004 Republic National Convention, and thereafter.
Connie Pankratz, a spokeswoman for the city’s Law Department, said the court settlement “doesn’t require the N.Y.P.D. to implement new procedures, but rather, formalizes procedures they already have in place.”
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