|
LEGAL DOCUMENTS
JEREMY CONRAD v. The CITY OF NEW YORK; RAYMOND W. KELLY, Commissioner of the New York City Police Department; JOHN DOES and JANE DOES 1-10 Officers of the New York City Police Department
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK
-----------------------------------------------------
JEREMY CONRAD,
Plaintiff,
versus
The CITY OF NEW YORK; RAYMOND W.
KELLY, Commissioner of the New York City
Police Department; JOHN DOES and JANE
DOES 1-10 Officers of the New York City
Police Department
Defendant.
-----------------------------------------------------
|
x
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
x
|
COMPLAINT
03 Civ.
|
Preliminary Statement
1. This is an action to vindicate the civil rights of individuals who seek to attend and participate in lawful and peaceful demonstrations in New York City. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) has adopted a policy and practice of unreasonably restricting access to large demonstrations by using police officers and barricades to close off sidewalks and streets leading to demonstration sites, by failing to provide advance notice to the public about available means of access to demonstrations sites, and by failing or refusing to provide information to members of the public seeking to reach demonstration sites. The NYPD has also employed a practice of using unreasonable physical force with horses to disperse large crowds of peaceful demonstrators seeking access to demonstrations. Finally, the NYPD has a policy and practice of detaining persons arrested for minor offenses at demonstrations in vans or other vehicles for unreasonably long periods of time without access to food, water, or bathroom facilities. As a result of these policies and practices, large numbers of people are being prevented from attending demonstrations and those who try to attend are at risk of serious physical injury.
2. Plaintiff Jeremy Conrad is a 27-year-old resident of Brooklyn who is now a law student and who attempted on February 15, 2003 to attend the large anti-war demonstration in New York City. As a result of NYPD policies and practices of restricting access to the demonstration, Mr. Conrad -- like tens of thousands of other people -- never made it to the demonstration. Rather, he and his girlfriend were trapped with a large crowd on Third Avenue, where he was injured when he was stepped on by a horse used by the NYPD to charge the crowd. When Mr. Conrad complained to officers that those in the crowd could not move and risked injury, he was singled out for arrest and maliciously punched and kicked by police officers. Mr. Conrad then was detained for about seven and a half hours in a cage in the back of an unheated and unlit van without food, water, or access to bathroom facilities. Finally, NYPD officers forced Mr. Conrad and others to stand outside Police Headquarters in fourteen-degree weather in handcuffs for approximately an hour and a half before issuing him a summons for a minor offense and releasing him.
3. The Republican National Convention is scheduled to take place in New York City starting in late August 2004. The Convention is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of peaceful protesters to events similar to the anti-war protests of earlier this year, including the large demonstration on February 15. Upon information and belief, the demonstration tactics employed by the NYPD at the February 15 demonstration and challenged in this case will be employed by the NYPD at demonstrations held during the Convention.
4. The plaintiff Jeremy Conrad intends to attend and participate in demonstrations at the Republican National Convention next August and September. His right to engage in this First Amendment activity, however, will be substantially burdened by the NYPD’s demonstration tactics. In addition, Mr. Conrad fears for his physical safety should he seek to attend large demonstrations in New York City where these tactics will be employed.
5. The NYPD’s policies and practices of restricting access to demonstrations, its policies and practices of using horses to forcefully disperse peacefully assembled demonstrators, and its policies and practices of detaining those arrested for minor offenses in vehicles for long periods of time without access to food, water, or bathroom facilities violate the First, Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution as well as provisions of the New York State Constitution. Mr. Conrad seeks a declaration that these policies are unlawful, a declaration that his arrest and detention were unlawful, and an injunction against further enforcement of the policies and practices of restricting access to demonstrations and to the policies and practices of using horses to forcefully disperse peaceful crowds of demonstrators. Plaintiff also seeks compensatory and punitive damages for the physical and emotional injuries inflicted on him by the defendants on February 15, 2003.
Jurisdiction And Venue
6. This court has subject?matter jurisdiction over the plaintiff’s claims pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331, 1343(3-4).
7. Venue is proper pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1391(b) in that plaintiff’s claims arise in the Southern District of New York.
8. Jurisdiction to grant declaratory judgment is conferred by 28 U.S.S. §§ 2201, 2202. Injunctive relief is authorized by Rule 65 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. An award of costs and attorneys fees is authorized pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1988.
9. This court has supplemental jurisdiction over all state constitutional and state law claims pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1367(a).
Parties
10. Plaintiff JEREMY CONRAD is a resident of Brooklyn in New York City.
11. Defendant the CITY OF NEW YORK is a municipal corporation within the State of New York.
12. Defendant RAYMOND W. KELLY is the Commissioner of the New York City Police Department. He is sued in his official capacity for injunctive relief.
13. Defendants JOHN DOES and JANE DOES are individuals employed by the NYPD whose identities are not now known to the plaintiff. These defendants arrested Mr. Conrad, assaulted him while making the arrest, and ordered that he be detained for an unreasonably lengthy period of time in unlawful conditions. They are sued in their official capacities for compensatory damages and in their individual capacities for compensatory and punitive damages.
Facts
14. On February 15, 2003, a large demonstration against the impending invasion of Iraq by the United States took place in New York City on First Avenue north of 51st Street. The demonstration took place only after a substantial dispute arose when the NYPD refused to issue a march permit for the event and the federal courts upheld that denial.
15. In sustaining the NYPD’s refusal to allow a march to take place, the District Court concluded that the decision to ban the march was a reasonable time, place and manner restriction, emphasizing that the City’s proposal for a stationary rally “[d]id not limit the number of participants who could attend the event.” United for Peace and Justice v. City of New York, 243 F. Supp. 2d. 19, 29 (S.D.N.Y. 2003).
16. Plaintiff Jeremy Conrad is a 27-year-old resident of Brooklyn. On February 15, 2003, he was residing on Suffolk Street in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. In August 2003, he began his legal education at Brooklyn Law School.
17. Mr. Conrad is a conscientious citizen and a politically active individual. In college, during a year of study abroad at Oxford University, he attended a rally in Oxford protesting a tuition hike for English students. That same year, Mr. Conrad participated in a strike in Paris protesting the low wages of Parisian interns. After college, eager to promote a positive image of the United States abroad and to serve his country, Mr. Conrad served two years in the Peace Corps in Senegal, West Africa. Prior to the incidents that prompted this lawsuit, Mr. Conrad had never been arrested.
18. Without advance notice to the public, the NYPD on February 15 implemented a set of measures that significantly restricted public access to the anti-war demonstration scheduled to take place on First Avenue. First Avenue south of 51st Street was closed entirely, and access to Second Avenue was severely restricted and then closed entirely. Protestors were required to filter onto First Avenue via the cross streets starting at 52nd Street and then walk south down First Avenue until they reached the demonstration. As blocks of First Avenue north of 51st Street filled with demonstrators, the NYPD used barricades and police officers to close the corresponding cross streets leading east to First Avenue, starting at 52nd Street and going north. As a result of this plan, the only way to reach the demonstration site was to walk north on Third Avenue or on avenues further west to areas where the cross streets were not closed off, walk east to First Avenue, and then return south. Even before the event had started, the NYPD had closed all cross streets up to at least 60th Street.
19. Many people seeking to attend the demonstration came from out of town and arrived at either Penn Station or Grand Central Station and planned on walking east to First Avenue. In addition, many people took subways to Grand Central or walked from areas south of the demonstration site. However, having closed First Avenue south of the demonstration site and having severely restricted access to and then having closed Second Avenue, the police channeled most demonstrators onto Third Avenue and other avenues farther west. Demonstrators were reluctant to proceed north on these avenues because they wanted to move east toward the speakers’ platform at 51st Street and First Avenue.
20. The NYPD failed to take any meaningful measures to inform the public of its restrictive access plan. As a result, those seeking to attend the event had no advance notice of the restrictions on access. Then, as tens of thousands of people arrived near the demonstration site on February 15, the NYPD had no system in place for informing them how to access the demonstration. No signs were posted at blockaded streets telling demonstrators how to get to the demonstration. Police officers manning barricades along Third and Second Avenues had no amplified sound to communicate information to those trying to get to the demonstration and had no printed information to provide to them. Instead, demonstrators were forced to ask individual police officers for directions. These police officers either provided no information or provided inaccurate information about how to reach the rally, and in many instances the officers may not have had accurate information to convey to demonstrators even if they had been willing and able to be helpful. The combination of barricades, closed streets, and lack of information and communication created a chaotic situation and resulted in tens of thousands of people being trapped at locations along Second, Third and Lexington Avenues.
21. Making matters worse, as crowds of protestors tried to make sense of the confusion and walk towards First Avenue, the NYPD haphazardly erected and removed barricades in their paths all along the Avenues and cross streets in the demonstration area. The use of barricades without any apparent purpose severely impeded the protestors’ ability to reach the protest site on First Avenue.
22. On February 15, 2003, Mr. Conrad and his girlfriend, Ephrat Livni, were among the more than one hundred thousand protestors who sought to attend the anti-war demonstration against the impending war with Iraq. Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni did not go to the event to create civil unrest or to make a statement by getting arrested, but instead hoped to exercise their First Amendment rights and to express their views in a peaceful manner.
23. Mr. Conrad expected to spend just one or two hours at the February 15 rally. He ate at 10 a.m. that day and used the restroom prior to departure from his apartment. At approximately 12:30 p.m., Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni left their apartment on foot for the rally.
24. Mr. Conrad, as well as many other downtown residents, intended to walk uptown on First Avenue to access the demonstration site. As they proceeded north, Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni encountered a group of uniformed police officers who had barricaded First Avenue. Pursuant to the NYPD’s policy for controlling access into the demonstration area, these officers barred the plaintiff, Ms. Livni, and other protestors arriving in the area from continuing along First Avenue towards the demonstration site. Instead, the officers redirected everyone away from the site and to the west.
25. Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni followed the officers’ orders and proceeded west. Upon arriving at Second Avenue, Mr. Conrad noticed an even larger crowd in the distance walking up Third Avenue. Confused, Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni believed that they needed to join the crowd on Third Avenue in order to reach the demonstration site. They began to walk still farther west, away from the announced location of the event.
26. When they arrived at Third Avenue, Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni were required to cross more police barricades guarded by uniformed officers of the NYPD. They observed that the officers were allowing people to enter Third Avenue from the east and travel west, as they had done, but were preventing protestors from exiting Third Avenue to walk east towards the demonstration site. Seeing that the large mass of protestors was walking north up Third Avenue and still confused as to where to go, Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni decided to join the crowd and head north, as well.
27. As Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni headed north through this confusion on Third Avenue, the crowd in which they were walking became more and more dense. The sidewalks were thick with people, as thousands of protestors crammed in shoulder to shoulder on the concrete. Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni became trapped, barely able to move in the sea of people, and the crowd finally spilled off the sidewalk and onto the street.
28. Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni’s confusion as to where to walk and what to do to reach the demonstration site was widely shared by many other would-be protestors. The NYPD’s overly restrictive control of access to the rally, in conjunction with the Department’s failure to provide information about how to get to the rally, prevented tens of thousands of people from reaching the rally site. Many demonstrators reported that police officers directed them to take routes leading away from the rally. One demonstrator reported, “[The police] herded us in circles, forced us to walk aimlessly, and refused to give information.” Another participant explained, “[W]hen I asked one officer where I was to go and how to get to the demonstration he said ‘home.’” Videotape of the incident also captures mounted officers telling people to “go home.”
29. When Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni neared 53rd Street and Third Avenue, they saw a line of approximately twenty police officers on horseback ride onto Third Avenue from a side street. Then, without any apparent warning or announcement, a number of the mounted police charged in a “V” formation directly into the crowd. The NYPD made no attempt prior to the charge to disperse the crowd by other means.
30. When the horses halted, many demonstrators found themselves stuck between mounted police officers. Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni were trapped between two horses, one of which stepped on Mr. Conrad’s foot causing him to cry out in pain.
31. The incident of misconduct and injury by the mounted police that Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni experienced was just one among many that occurred on February 15, 2003. Mounted police officers repeatedly charged into dense crowds of demonstrators at multiple locations, including on Lexington Avenue, Second Avenue and Third Avenue, despite the fact that protestors were demonstrating peacefully, without violence. The demonstrators cooperated with the police and attempted to obey police instructions as best they could, despite the massive crowding. In contrast, the mounted police officers appeared to ignore the fact that the demonstrators in their path, including the elderly and young children, were packed together so closely that they had nowhere to move when charged by the horses.
32. The NYCLU received approximately 125 accounts by e-mail, fax and letter that complained of mounted officers charging into dense crowds at the February 15 rally. The Civilian Complaint Review Board received about 30 complaints relating to police use of horses on February 15. Demonstrators reported being knocked to the ground, trampled, and hit in the head by horses, as well as being charged and chased on the sidewalks.
33. In one e-mail received by the NYCLU, a woman who was standing on 51st Street and Third Avenue described how a horse swung around and cracked her in the skull. She wrote, “I felt an impact like a two-by-four board cracking me on the forehead. I remember jerking backward against the person behind me ... My glasses were squashed against my nose and face and my right lens got a deep scratch.... I felt dazed and lightheaded. The horse’s spit coated my lens [and] ... my vision was blurry....” This woman needed to go to the hospital for neurological tests after the rally.
34. An e-mail from a history professor who had been caught in the middle of crowd described the scene as horses rushed onto demonstrators. “Suddenly, a row of maybe a dozen mounted police appeared in front of us.... They made no announcement, issued no warnings ... and soon a phalanx of horses rushed us. Immediately, screams erupted from the front as people were pushed aside and knocked over. As some people fell, the cops kicked their horses’ sides, urging them on.... The police seemed intent on driving the noses of their mounts into our heads....”
35. The officers who charged their horses into the crowds on February 15, 2003, were members of the NYPD’s Mounted Unit. The Mounted Unit is within the Traffic Control Division of the NYPD’s Patrol Bureau and consists of approximately 160 police officers and 100 horses weighing between 1100 and 1300 pounds.
36. Upon information and belief , the NYPD does not have in place adequate safeguards and policies limiting the use of NYPD horses at demonstrations so as to assure that demonstrators will not be placed at unnecessary risk of injury.
37. The official responsible for the use of horses at the February 15, 2003 demonstration was the NYPD Chief of Department Joseph Esposito.
38. After the mounted officers charged the crowd in which Mr. Conrad and Ms. Livni stood, police officers formed two lines in the center of Third Avenue running the length of the block. Wearing helmets and carrying batons, the officers nearest Mr. Conrad lined up shoulder to shoulder, facing the crowd, and began pushing people towards the sidewalk. The officers never warned the crowd that they would begin using force, nor did they issue any order to move to the sidewalk. People were packed together so tightly that whenever the police relaxed their efforts to move the crowd, the crowd could not help but expand back out to the police line.
39. As the officers approached, Mr. Conrad told them that he and the other protestors could not move back because there were too many people. In response to Mr. Conrad’s words, a hefty officer, approximately six feet tall, standing behind the line of riot police pointed to him and said, “That guy’s going.” The identity of this John Doe defendant police officer is not known to the plaintiff at this time.
40. The officer grabbed the plaintiff and dragged him to the ground in the middle of the street, pulling so hard as to burst the buttons on his coat and tear his sweater. Mr. Conrad curled into a fetal position with one arm behind his back and one arm protecting his groin. Four to six police officers descended upon Mr. Conrad, punching and kicking him in the chest, arms and legs. One officer pressed his knee into the plaintiff’s head in order to hold him down. Another officer yelled at Mr. Conrad that he was resisting arrest, while plaintiff repeatedly asserted that he was not resisting. In hopes of ending the beating, Mr. Conrad yelled several times that he was going to move his arm from protecting his groin to behind his back. As soon as plaintiff moved his arm, officers punched plaintiff twice in the groin and at least once in the stomach. The officers placed Mr. Conrad in handcuffs and hoisted him up by his arms. Upon information and belief, the arrest occurred between 2:00 and 2:30 p.m. The identities of the John and Jane Doe officers who punched and kicked Mr. Conrad and who placed him under arrest are not known to plaintiff at this time.
41. Mr. Conrad did not engage in any unlawful conduct that would have justified his arrest. Rather, he was arrested in retaliation for his effort to express to police officers his concerns that their use of physical force risked injury to peacefully assembled protesters.
42. The force employed by the NYPD officers when arresting Mr. Conrad was excessive and without lawful justification.
43. What happened to plaintiff Jeremy Conrad was not an isolated incident of the NYPD’s use of unreasonable and excessive force at the demonstration. Witness accounts document many other such episodes, including one in which police pushed aside a man in a wheelchair and others where officers pushed and shoved elderly protestors for no discernible reason. Officers used their batons to beat protestors when they wanted them to move, and in one incident a police officer jabbed a 63-year old woman so hard that she crashed to the sidewalk. Officers used pepper spray on protestors in apparent violation of NYPD policy.
44. The use of excessive force only increased during arrests. Police officers beat people during arrest, throwing one protestor onto the ground into horse manure and beating others who had already been thrown to the ground and subdued. Officers slammed a young boy head first into a police van before throwing him to the pavement, and sat on another protestor who appeared unconscious with blood around his head. In another failure to heed protestors’ injuries, officers pushed a woman and pulled back her arms despite the fact that she had a bandaged, broken arm and a cast on her leg.
45. After Mr. Conrad was arrested, an officer escorted him to a van a short distance away. The van in which Mr. Conrad was placed was unheated and unlit. On the inside, the van consisted of several caged areas. The front of the van consisted of the driver’s area which was sectioned off from the prisoners’ area. The prisoner area consisted of four spaces, all of which were caged and secured by locked doors. One caged area was for police supplies and equipment and was located in the front of the van along the right wall. Directly opposite the equipment cage were two caged areas for prisoners. The equipment cage along the right wall of the van and the prisoner cages along the left wall were separated by a walkway which led to the fourth, and largest, caged area. This last area was also for prisoners and occupied the back half of the van. It was in this last, and largest, cage that Mr. Conrad was placed upon reaching the van. After being placed in the van, Mr. Conrad’s handcuffs were tight and cutting into his wrists, causing his hands to swell. Mr. Conrad slid his wrists underneath and around his legs to the front of his body and raised his hands over his head to reduce the swelling. Even after some of the swelling went down, however, his handcuffs remained so tight that he could not move them at all.
46. When he was arrested, officers placed Mr. Conrad in plastic handcuffs. These handcuffs were secured tightly and cut into Mr. Conrad’s wrists, causing his hands to swell. Once in the van, Mr. Conrad slid his wrists underneath and around his legs to the front of his body and raised his hands over his head to reduce the swelling. Even after some of the swelling went down, however, his handcuffs remained so tight that he could not move them at all.
47. While Mr. Conrad was waiting in the van, other demonstrators were brought into it. At times the van was completely full, while at other times officers removed some of the demonstrators. Approximately forty-five minutes after Mr. Conrad was placed in the van, an officer drove the van to the Jacob Javits Center. After waiting there for about fifteen minutes, the officer drove the van, containing approximately twenty arrested protestors, downtown to One Police Plaza. When he was arrested, officers placed Mr. Conrad in handcuffs. These handcuffs were secured tightly and cut into Mr. Conrad’s wrists, causing his hands to swell. Once in the van, Mr. Conrad slid his wrists underneath and around his legs to the front of his body and raised his hands over his head to reduce the swelling. Even after some of the swelling went down, however, his handcuffs remained so tight that he could not more the cuffs at all.
48. One Police Plaza is the headquarters of the NYPD.
49. The van holding Mr. Conrad and the others arrived outside of police headquarters roughly between 3:00 p.m. and 3:30 p.m., where it remained with the arrested protestors inside of it for at least six and one-half hours. Soon after the van arrived at One Police Plaza, the arrested protestors began requesting the removal of their handcuffs. Eventually, an officer removed Mr. Conrad’s and the other protestors’ handcuffs.
50. Once their handcuffs were removed, arrestees, including the plaintiff, began to address other pressing needs by repeatedly requesting to use the bathroom facilities and to be provided with food and water. Despite the arrestees’ appeals, officers continually denied everyone access to these basic necessities. One of the arrestees, a male nurse, had a bottle of water and an orange, which he shared with the other arrestees. This was the only food and water they received until they were discharged shortly after midnight. The NYPD did not allow the arrestees to use the bathroom facilities prior to their release.
51. Many of the protestors in the van were young; some were old. Among others, the group included a high-school social-studies teacher, an elderly woman, a man in his fifties, and another older man in a suit who spent much of his time speaking on his cell phone to his lawyer. The elderly woman was locked in one of the front prisoner cages, with the two other men in the cage behind her. A number of young men, including Mr. Conrad, were locked in the main back cage. Mr. Conrad shared the use of his mobile phone with some of other arrested protestors so that they could contact family and friends to let them know where they were and what had happened to them. Split lips, bloody foreheads, and bruised wrists were common among the arrestees.
52. At approximately 10:00 p.m., officers removed everyone from the van and took them outside. The officers divided the arrested demonstrators into two groups. Members of each group were handcuffed to everyone else in their group with metal handcuffs and chains.
53. Plaintiff initially believed that they were being escorted to bathroom facilities inside police headquarters. Instead, they were forced to stand outside in a courtyard adjoining the headquarters, still chained together in the night air, for approximately one and a half hours. The temperature was fourteen degrees Fahrenheit. Mr. Conrad lost feeling in his toes fifteen minutes after being ordered outside. In an attempt to combat the extreme cold and warm themselves, the arrested demonstrators jumped up and down and sang songs.
54. There was no legitimate justification for the NYPD’s treatment of the plaintiff and the other arrested demonstrators. Defendants knew or should have known that leaving them in fourteen degree weather would pose a serious and unnecessary risk to their health. The identities of the John and Jane Doe employees of the City of New York who ordered that the plaintiff be held in these conditions are not known to the plaintiff at this time.
55. At approximately 11:30 p.m., the officers led Mr. Conrad and the other arrested demonstrators into two paddy wagons, with each group of ten in its own paddy wagon. The driver’s area of the wagon was walled off from the prisoners’ area, which constituted the bulk of the wagon, in the back. In the prisoners’ area of the paddy wagon there were two benches, one each along the left and right walls. Each group was kept in its chain gang formation when it was placed in its respective wagon. As a result, each member of the handcuffed pair had to sit opposite from the other so that his handcuffed wrist was stretched out into the middle of the wagon and held there. Plaintiff waited in this position for approximately another half hour before being issued a summons.
56. Upon information and belief, Mr. Conrad was issued of summons for disorderly conduct pursuant to section 240.20 of the New York State Penal Law.
57. Shortly after midnight on February 16 -- more than nine and one-half hours after his arrest for an offense classified under New York law as a violation -- the NYPD finally released Mr. Conrad from custody.
58. The NYPD had no lawful justification for detaining Mr. Conrad for such an unreasonable length of time.
59. Mr. Conrad was just one among many demonstrators arrested at the February 15 demonstration who reported excessively long detention periods in harsh conditions. Many arrested protestors reported being driven around the city with no heat, food, or water for five hours or more. They remained in plastic cuffs for excessively long periods of time, although plastics cuffs are not intended for prolonged use. The cuffs cut off their circulation and broke their skin. Multiple groups of arrestees were forced to stand outside of One Police Plaza for over two hours. Finally, arrested protestors were routinely refused bathroom facilities, even upon arrival at One Police Plaza and despite the fact that some demonstrators were forced to urinate and soil themselves because of the long wait.
60. In one e-mail received by the NYCLU, an arrested demonstrator described his experiences in a police van following his arrest: “We were driven in circles for awhile, and then we were transferred to a vehicle with no windows. When placed inside with the doors closed, it was pitch black.... It was ultimate claustrophobia; you couldn’t see anything, but could hear other people in there with you.... They drove us around (I don’t know where) and every so often, they would open this little window up front and ask us info. If someone didn’t cooperate, they would curse them off and shut it. Then they’d open it again a while later; the process would repeat, and it never ended.”
61. Another e-mail recounts how arrestees were forced to stand outside in the cold for long periods of time: “At around 9:15, they unloaded us in groups of six. Each of us had one handcuff, attached to the group by a long chain. We were taken outside, and made to stand in a straight line by a wall. There were six other people already standing in the area, who were individually handcuffed, their hands behind their backs, some without gloves. Those without gloves were clearly in pain, there (sic) hands noticeably swelling up and purple.... It was extremely cold and we were not given gloves or anything. . . . .”
62. The policies and practices employed by the NYPD in conjunction with the February 15, 2003, demonstration have been used by the Department at other demonstrations in New York City.
63. The NYPD has a practice and policy of closing off sidewalks and streets with barricades and police officers and failing to provide adequate information to demonstrators about how to navigate these barricades and reach demonstration sites. This practice or policy substantially and unnecessarily restricts access to demonstrations.
64. One of the first large demonstrations at which the NYPD used barricades and police officers unreasonably to close streets leading to major demonstrations was the Million Youth March rally that took place in Harlem on September 5, 1998. That demonstration -- the stated purpose of which was to support the empowerment of black youth -- was held on six blocks of Malcolm X Boulevard north of 118th Street.
65. For the Million Youth March event, the NYPD used police officers and barricades to restrict or completely close off access to many streets leading to the rally site. Thousands of people seeking to attend the demonstration were prevented from entering blocks leading to the demonstration and instead were directed to other streets that they were told were open as access routes. When they arrived at those streets, police officers refused to allow them to use the streets but instead sent them off to yet other streets. Through these actions, the NYPD prevented large numbers of people from ever reaching the demonstration.
66. On September 9, 2003, the New York Civil Liberties Union held a demonstration in front of Federal Hall in connection with a visit to New York City by Attorney General John Ashcroft. The NYCLU had a permit for the demonstration, which took place between approximately 12:00 noon and 2:00 p.m. and attracted as many as 2,500 demonstrators.
67. The NYPD used police officers and barricades to close most of the sidewalks and streets leading to the site of the NYCLU’s demonstration on September 9, severely restricting access to the event. The NYCLU received numerous reports that people seeking to reach the rally were stopped by police officers and given incomplete or inaccurate information about how to reach the demonstration. Upon information and belief, the NYPD’s actions restricting access to this demonstration prevented significant numbers of people from reaching the demonstration and thus reduced attendance at the event.
68. Upon information and belief, the NYPD has a practice or policy of using horses to disperse peaceful demonstrators in a manner that unnecessarily risks and causes injury to these demonstrators. The Mounted Unit’s mission includes crowd control and, as the NYPD’s web site states, mounted officers “are used extensively at concerts, demonstrations, strikes, entertainment events, public celebrations, and the numerous assemblages that take place throughout the year.” Charging into crowds with horses constitutes a degree of physical force unnecessary under the circumstances and has the potential to cause grave, long-term injury.
69. The NYPD employed police officers on horses at other peaceful anti-war demonstrations this year, including a large march that took place on March 22, 2003.
70. Upon information and belief, the NYPD has no written guidelines restricting the use of NYPD horses at demonstrations so as to assure that demonstrators will not be placed at unnecessary risk of injury.
71. Upon information and belief, the NYPD has a policy and practice of detaining demonstrators arrested for minor offenses for long periods of time in unheated and unlighted vehicles without affording them access to food, water, or bathroom facilities. Upon information and belief, the NYPD employed these policies and practices at other anti-war events in the spring of 2003 as well as at demonstrations at the World Economic Forum in February 2002.
72. As a result of the defendants’ unlawful actions, Mr. Conrad received numerous bruises and cuts all over his body, including on his face, ribs, wrists, and knee. Plaintiff’s toe, where he was stepped on by the horse, was so swollen and painful that he was incapable of moving it, and it stuck straight up. Because of this injury, the plaintiff suffered from a limp for approximately one and one-half months and occasionally still has pain in his toe.
73. As a result of the defendants’ actions, Mr. Conrad has suffered and continues to suffer extreme emotional distress. Mr. Conrad did not leave his apartment for three days following his release from custody because he was afraid that if he went outdoors, he might encounter the police. He missed two days of work as a result of this trauma. Mr. Conrad continues to fear the NYPD. He crosses to the other side of the street when police officers approach and is afraid to attend public events--including other political protests related to the war in Iraq--at which NYPD officers are present.
74. Mr. Conrad feels strongly about the war in Iraq and wanted to take part in a large protest march that took place in New York City on March 22, 2003. He did not participate in that march, however, because the unconstitutional actions perpetrated by the defendants on February 15, 2003, caused Mr. Conrad to fear that he again would be mistreated and retaliated against by the NYPD if he attended the demonstration.
75. Mr. Conrad would like to attend future demonstrations in New York City, particularly the Republican National Convention to be held during August and September 2004. The Convention is expected to attract large numbers of demonstrators and is likely to pose crowd challenges similar to those encountered on February 15.
76. The most recent Republican National Convention took place in 2000 in Philadelphia. At that event, law-enforcement officials arrested large numbers of protesters and detained them for unreasonably long periods of time.
77. The defendants’ actions were taken under color of law.
78. Mr. Conrad filed a Notice of Claim on May 14, 2003.
Jury Demand
79. The plaintiff demands a trial by jury on each of and every one of his claims.
First Cause Of Action
80. The NYPD’s policies and practices of using barricades and police officers to restrict access to demonstrations, in conjunction with the Department’s failure to provide information to the public about the restrictions and available access to demonstration sites, violate the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
Second Cause Of Action
81. The NYPD’s policies and practices of using horses to forcefully disperse crowds of peacefully assembled demonstrators violate the First and Fourth Amendments to the United States Constitution and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
Third Cause Of Action
82. The NYPD’s policies and practices of restricting access to demonstrations and of using horses to forcefully disperse lawfully assembled demonstrators violate sections 8 and 12 of Article I of the New York State Constitution.
Fourth Cause Of Action
83. The arrest and detention of the plaintiff in retaliation for his warning NYPD officers that their actions threatened injury to peacefully assembled demonstrators violated the First and Fourth Amendments to the United States Constitution and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
Fifth Cause Of Action
84. The physical assault on the plaintiff in conjunction with his arrest violated the First and Fourth Amendments to the United States Constitution and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
Sixth Cause Of Action
85. The conditions in which and the length of time for which plaintiff was detained violated the plaintiff’s rights under the First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
Seventh Cause Of Action
86. The defendants violated the plaintiff’s right under the common law of New York and the New York State Constitution by arresting him without probable cause to believe that he had committed any crime.
Eighth Cause Of Action
87. The defendants violated the plaintiff's rights under the common law of New York law and the New York State Constitution by detaining and imprisoning him without probable cause to believe that he had committed any crime.
Ninth Cause Of Action
88. The defendants violated the plaintiff’s rights under the common law of New York to be free from assault and battery and his rights under Article 1, Section 12 of the New York State Constitution when they struck him with a horse and when they physically assaulted him in conjunction with his arrest.
WHEREFORE, the plaintiffs request that this court:
Assume jurisdiction over this matter; Issue a declaratory judgment that defendants’ policies and practices of restricting access to demonstrations violates the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and violate the New York State Constitution; Issue a declaratory judgment that the defendants’ policies and practices of using horses to forcefully disperse peaceable crowds violates the First and Fourth Amendments to the United States Constitution and violate the New York State Constitution; Issue a declaratory judgment that the defendants’ policies and practices of detaining demonstrators arrested for minor offenses for long periods of time in vehicles without access to food, water, or bathroom facilities violate the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and violate the New York State Constitution; Issue a declaratory judgment that the plaintiff’s arrest and detention violated the First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and violated the Constitution and the laws of New York; Issue an injunction prohibiting the defendants from enforcing their policies and practices of restricting access to demonstrations; Issue an injunction prohibiting the defendants from using horses to forcefully disperse peacefully assembled demonstrators; Award the plaintiff Jeremy Conrad compensatory damages; Award the plaintiff Jeremy Conrad punitive damages against John and Jane Does in their individual capacities; Award the plaintiffs attorneys’ fees and costs; and Grant any other relief the court deems appropriate.
Respectfully submitted,
CHRISTOPHER DUNN (CD-3991)
ARTHUR EISENBERG (AE-2012)
DONNA LIEBERMAN (DL-1268)
New York Civil Liberties Union Foundation
125 Broad Street, 17th Floor
New York, N.Y. 10004
(212) 344-3005
Counsel for the Plaintiff
Dated: November 19, 2003
New York, N.Y.
On the complaint:
JUSTIN GIOVANNELLI*
Law Student
New York University School of Law
Civil Rights Clinic
ELIZABETH A. MOLLER*
Law Student
New York University School of Law
Civil Rights Clinic
JOSEPH W. TRELOAR*
Law Student
New York University School of Law
Civil Rights Clinic
*The plaintiff and the New York Civil Liberties Union Foundation will be seeking leave of court to permit these students to serve as attorneys in this matter pursuant to the Southern District’s Plan for Student Practice in Civil Actions.
| 
