NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- Two NYPD officers were placed on modified duty after video emerged showing them violently arresting a man who they'd mistaken for a suspect at a liquor store in Brooklyn.
The officers’ guns and shields were taken away as the department’s Internal Affairs investigates.
“I understand the community interest in it, because it is an upsetting video,” NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said Wednesday.
The nearly 8-minute video was recorded Tuesday afternoon inside the Brooklyn Wine Depot on Hoyt Street in Boerum Hill.
The witness behind the camera, Abelee Moran, spoke with the media on Wednesday and called for the officers to be arrested, saying she watched in horror as the man was kicked, punched and dragged by the two officers.
The two officers work in the Narcotics Borough and were searching for a man who’d helped sell crack cocaine to an undercover officer.Courtesy of Abelee Moran
Video shows wine bottles crashing to the floor as the officers struggle to arrest the man. A pool of blood is seen near his leg as a crowd gathers outside.
“The way you guys handled that situation was disgusting,” Moran said.
She called for the officers to be arrested, saying, “What happened was not right, it was not fair, it was racist, and we are tired of it.”
The two officers were working a narcotics investigation and searching for a man who’d helped sell crack cocaine to an undercover officer. They were searching for a Black man in a white shirt and green shorts.
But it turns out the man they encountered in the store was not the suspect who they were after. The man seen in the video was later released, and he won’t be charged.
Moran said she wishes she’d done more to help him at the time.
“I feel like I should have thrown my body to protect this man, but I was scared,” she said.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani called the video "extremely disturbing and unacceptable."
"Officers should never treat a person this way. The NYPD is conducting a full investigation into this incident," the mayor said.
