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      Critics Fault ‘Aggressive’ N.Y.P.D. Response to Pro-Palestinian Rally

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      Officers were filmed punching three demonstrators at the protest in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. The police said protesters were blocking the streets.Violent confrontations at a pro-Palestinian rally in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, on Saturday reflected what some local officials and protest organizers called an unexpectedly aggressive Police Department response, with officers flooding the neighborhood and using force against protesters.At the rally, which drew hundreds of demonstrators, at least two officers wearing the white shirts of commanders were filmed punching three protesters who were prone in the middle of a crosswalk. One officer had pinned a man to the ground and repeatedly punched him in the ribs, a 50-second video clip shows. Another officer punched the left side of a man’s face as he held his head to the asphalt.The police arrested around 40 people who were “unlawfully blocking roadways,” Kaz Daughtry, the department’s deputy commissioner of operations, said on social media on Sunday.Mr. Daughtry shared drone footage of one person who climbed on a city bus, “putting himself and others in danger.” The Police Department, he wrote, “proudly protects everyone’s right to protest, but lawlessness will never be tolerated.”Neither Mr. Daughtry nor the police commented on the use of force by officers. A spokeswoman for Mayor Eric Adams did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the police response. The Police Department’s patrol guide states that officers must use “only the reasonable force necessary to gain control or custody of a subject.”Bay Ridge has a significant Arab American population and hosts demonstrations in mid-May every year to commemorate what Palestinians call the Nakba, or “catastrophe” — when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes during the war that led to Israel’s founding in 1948.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      A Chaotic Night at U.C.L.A. Raises Questions About Police Response

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      Nearly two weeks after a pro-Palestinian encampment at the University of California, Los Angeles, was attacked by counterprotesters, university officials still have not explained why security officers stood by for hours while the attack was underway, nor have they arrested any of those who swarmed in wielding metal rods, water bottles and firecrackers in one of the worst outbreaks of violence in the college protests that have rocked the country.The extent of the policing failure has become clearer in recent days, as witnesses have come forward to describe a chaotic night of violence on April 30, in which students and bystanders repeatedly called 911 and nonemergency lines, finding little help and calls that were disconnected. A dispatcher told one caller pleading for help that they were ending the call because “I have actual emergencies to handle.”One man was filmed by a local television station on the phone with emergency dispatchers, alerting them that people were getting hurt. “Security has abandoned this encampment,” he could be heard saying before lowering his phone and looking at it. “They just hung up on me again,” he said incredulously.Miles away in Sacramento, staff members in Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office contacted the U.C.L.A. chancellor’s office shortly after 11 p.m. to make sure that law enforcement officers were responding to the scene, and were assured that more officers were coming, according to a person familiar with the situation, who described the discussions on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to make them public.Protesters and counterprotesters fought one another for hours before the police intervened.Mark Abramson for The New York TimesBut as the night wore on and there was still no intervention, the person said, the governor’s office moved to circumvent local authority and ordered California Highway Patrol officers to the campus. The state officers began assembling on campus at 1:45 a.m., a few moments before L.A.P.D. riot police arrived, but it took another hour to quell the clashes.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The Harsh Crackdown on College Protests Is A Dangerous Mistake

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      Two police cars idled across the street from the protest rally I was attending in front of the State Capitol in Austin, Texas, their red and blue lights flashing but their sirens silent. The police seemed more bored than annoyed. It was the early 2000s, and I had recently moved from Turkey to study at the University of Texas.My fellow protesters were outraged. “This is what a police state looks like!” they started chanting.I turned around, bewildered. Turkey was still emerging from the long shadow of the 1980 coup. For years, protests were suppressed, sometimes with deadly force. Even a whiff of disruption could get Istanbul shut down, with armored vehicles blocking major roads. Trust me, I said, this is not what a police state looks like.When I told my friends back home that Americans thought it was outrageous for the police even to show up at a demonstration, it was considered yet more evidence that I had been recruited by the C.I.A.“The American police showed up to a protest and did nothing?” one of my friends scoffed. “Just watched? No arrests? No heads bashed in?” Yeah, right.In the two decades that have passed since then, American protests have changed a bit. America’s response to them has changed a great deal.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Driver Dies After Crashing Into Barrier Near the White House

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      The Secret Service said the incident posed no threat to the public, and President Biden was in Delaware at the time of the crash.A driver died after crashing into a security barrier near the White House on Saturday night around 10:30, prompting an investigation by the Washington police department, the Secret Service said in a statement.“There is no threat or public safety implications,” Anthony Guglielmi, a Secret Service spokesman, wrote on social media, adding that the crash posed no threat to the White House. The city’s police department said it was investigating the crash “only as a traffic crash,” but the Secret Service said it would conduct a separate investigation into the driver’s background.President Biden was at his home in Wilmington, Del., at the time of the crash, having arrived there on Friday evening.The crash occurred on the eastern perimeters of the White House, near the intersection of 15th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, a six-lane boulevard that connects the White House and the U.S. Capitol, the Washington police said. The police arrived at the scene about 15 minutes after the crash and pronounced the driver, an adult male, dead.Some images of the incident from WJLA in Washington showed a heavily damaged silver sedan crashed a few feet into the outermost White House barricade that instructs drivers entering the premises to stop.In January, the police took a driver into custody after a vehicle crashed into a security barrier at the same intersection. And last May, a 19-year-old man crashed a rented U-Haul truck into White House security barriers. He told the authorities that he had been planning to kill Mr. Biden, who was at the White House at the time.In December, a Delaware man who the authorities said was driving while intoxicated crashed into Mr. Biden’s motorcade while the president was talking with reporters on the street in downtown Wilmington. That crash was considered accidental, and no one was injured. More

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      Body Cameras Show NYPD Fatally Shooting Win Rozario, Man Who Was Holding Scissors

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      The man, Win Rozario, 19, had called 911 and seemed to be in mental distress, officials and his family said. The police appeared to shoot him at least four times.Body camera footage of the police fatally shooting a 19-year-old Queens man in his kitchen in March shows what the police had described as a “chaotic” situation. But the video, released Friday, also renewed criticism of the decision to open fire on the man, who was holding scissors and seemed to be in mental distress.The man, Win Rozario, was declared dead at a hospital after the shooting on March 27, the police said. The New York attorney general’s office released the footage from body-worn cameras as part of its investigation into the shooting.The police arrived at Mr. Rozario’s home in Ozone Park that day in response to a 911 call for someone in mental distress, which officials said they believed Mr. Rozario had placed himself while in “mental crisis.” John Chell, the Police Department’s chief of patrol, said at the time that the officers had arrived within two minutes. The shooting occurred about three minutes after the officers, Matthew Cianfrocco and Salvatore Alongi, arrived at the scene, according to their videos.Chief Chell had said the shooting occurred after the situation had become “quite hectic, chaotic and dangerous right away.” He said the officers had “no choice” but to shoot Mr. Rozario after he moved toward the officers with the scissors.But Mr. Rozario’s younger brother, who witnessed the shooting, had disputed the police’s account and insisted that the officers had not needed to fire their guns.The videos show the officers at first using their stun guns on Mr. Rozario as he stands in the kitchen with the scissors, sometimes moving toward them quickly. Mr. Rozario’s mother repeatedly restrains him and stands between her son and the officers even after he has been hit with the stun gun more than once.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Eric Adams Seizes Role as Face of the Crackdown on Student Protests

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      Mayor Eric Adams on Wednesday defended the overnight arrests of nearly 300 campus protesters in New York City, praising the police for using restraint and arguing that protesters were antisemitic and led by outsiders who were part of a global effort to “radicalize young people.”Mr. Adams said at a news conference at the police headquarters that he had advised Columbia University’s leaders that the police had seen a shift in tactics at the protests led by “outside agitators” and that “you have more than a peaceful protest on your hands.”“They are attempting to disrupt our city and we are not going to permit it to happen,” Mr. Adams said.The police arrested 119 protesters at Columbia University on Tuesday and 173 people at the City College of New York after leaders at both schools requested assistance from the New York Police Department, the police said.For much of the weekslong protest at Columbia, university leaders have remained in the background, making much of their public pronouncements through campuswide advisories.In their absence, Mr. Adams, a Democrat and former police officer, has forcefully stepped in, embracing a role that adheres to his law enforcement background, his reputation as a mayor focused on reducing disorder and strong support for Israel over many years.As pro-Palestinian protests have erupted on campuses across New York City, Mr. Adams has gone beyond calling for order, calling protesters “despicable” and encouraging university leaders to quickly remove encampments.Mr. Adams said on Wednesday that he was proud of the police officers who removed a Palestinian flag that was hung from a flagpole at Columbia University and replaced it with an American flag — an image the police promoted widely.“Blame me for being proud to be an American,” Mr. Adams said. “We’re not surrendering our way of life to anyone.”City officials and the police said that the use of large chains to block doors and other tactics showed that “professional” activists were influencing student protesters. They have not named the outsiders who were involved in the protests and declined on Wednesday to say how many of the protesters who were arrested were not affiliated with the colleges.Left-leaning Democrats have criticized the mayor’s approach. Ana María Archila, a director of the New York Working Families Party, said that the police response on Tuesday was “reckless, escalatory and put the entire university community in harm’s way.”“This is a shameful day in our city’s history, and one that will not be forgotten,” she said.Jeffery C. Mays More

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      14 Protesters Are Arrested at Tulane After Police Clear Encampment

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      An encampment of protesters at Tulane University in New Orleans was cleared and at least 14 people were arrested early on Wednesday, the university said, after officers from three law enforcement agencies ordered the group to disperse. The campus police, the Louisiana State Police and the New Orleans Police forcibly removed the demonstrators. It was not immediately clear how many protesters were present, but two of the demonstrators who were arrested were students, the university said in a statement, adding that the encampment was an “unlawful demonstration.” Tulane is also investigating reports that faculty members participated in the protest.The university said the encampment was formed on Monday, and campus police officers also made arrests that evening. Six people, including one student, were taken into custody that night under charges that included trespassing, battery on an officer and resisting arrest, according to the university, which also issued seven suspensions.According to the student newspaper, The Tulane Hullabaloo, the campus police cordoned off the encampment on Tuesday, but did not try to disband it until early Wednesday. More

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      Columbia Asks N.Y.P.D. to Stay on Campus Through Middle of May

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      Columbia University asked the New York Police Department in a letter on Tuesday to clear a building occupied by pro-Palestinian protesters and encampments, and asked that the police remain on campus until at least May 17, after commencement.President Nemak Shafit requested the N.Y.P.D.’s assistance in a letter that was released after police entered Hamilton Hall and arrested protesters that had occupied the building on early Tuesday. Columbia’s commencement is currently scheduled for May 15.By late evening, dozens of police officers had arrived, climbed through windows on campus and arrested protesters who had occupied a building since early Tuesday. Much of the campus had been cleared of people, although dozens of protesters still chanted outside of its gates.Dr. Shafik said in the letter that “the takeover of Hamilton Hall and the continued encampments raise serious safety concerns for the individuals involved and the entire community,” adding that “these activities have become a magnet for protesters outside our gates which creates significant risk to our campus and disrupts the ability of the University to continue normal operations.”A decision earlier this month to bring police onto campus to clear a tent protest led to sharp criticism from some students and faculty. But Dr. Shafik said on Tuesday that she was left with “no choice.”“With the support of the University’s Trustees, I have determined that the building occupation, the encampments, and related disruptions pose a clear and present danger to persons, property, and the substantial functioning of the University and require the use of emergency authority to protect persons and property,” she wrote.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More