A person leads a chant during a protest march in support of the Black Lives Matter movement and other groups, Thursday, July 30, 2020, in New York. | John Minchillo / AP Photo
NEW YORK – State Attorney General Tish James is suing the NYPD for her response to police brutality protests that swept the city last year, accusing her of showing a pattern of excessive force and false arrests against protesters. .
In a federal lawsuit filed on Thursday against Mayor Bill de Blasio, police commissioner Dermot Shea and department head Terence Monahan, James calls for the installation of a federal monitor to oversee the NYPD.
“What we found was a blatant abuse of police power, excessive and unbridled use of force and a leadership unable and unwilling to stop it,” James told a news conference on Thursday.
The attorney general’s office investigated how the NYPD handled the protests and found that NYPD officials engaged in the rampant use of batons, pepper spray and a tactic known as kettling to surround and surround protesters. They also illegally arrested legal observers and doctors, she claims.
His lawsuit also seeks a court order declaring that the NYPD’s response to the protests was unconstitutional.