Who can forget the video of New York City Police Officer Patrick Pogan nailing bicyclist Christopher Long during the Critical Mass ride last July. It was a classic, to be forever remembered as “The Big Shove.” The New York Times announced yesterday that Pogan has been indicted in New York County, a mere 5 months later, (H/T Turk).
So what if it took the District Attorney five months to indict Pogan, despite the fact that there was a video that conclusively disproved the allegations under penalty of perjury made by Pogan against Long in a criminal court complaint. What’s five months between friends? It happened. Can’t we just be happy about that? Stop muttering “justice delayed is justice…”
Stuart London, representing Pogan, had this to say:
“My client denies any wrongdoing in this matter,” Mr. London said in an interview Monday afternoon. “I would have people withhold judgment until all the evidence comes out about the bicyclist’s actions prior to my client taking action.”
But Stu, there’s a VIDEO. Your guy, the cop, swore that the biker tried to run him down. There’s a VIDEO that shows that your guy is lying. Have you given any thought to an insanity defense? No, your right. Stupidity and insanity are not the same thing.
So why should I be so harsh toward this defendant, when preaching that defendants should be presumed innocent? It’s true that there’s some dissonance here, but beyond the fact that there’s a VIDEO and that Pogan is a cop, there is one additional factor that removes that bone in my head that makes me want to be a little bit sympathetic.
The fact that Pogan sought to have Long, the cyclist, prosecuted based on a flagrantly perjurious complaint for a crime that never happened in order to cover up Pogan’s own vicious assault sucks all the sympathy out of me on this one. But for video, Pogan would have been successful and Long would have gone down. But for video, no one would have believed that this case wouldn’t travel the ordinary path, where judges, prosecutors, defense lawyers and perhaps even jury just shook their collective heads and assumed that the cop was right, the cyclist was wrong, and then it would be time to share a beer at Forlini’s after the cyclist was sentenced. Life as usual at 100 Centre Street.
Instead, five months later, Patrick Pogan stands indicted. But for video, this would not have happened.
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Well, yeah. Now, since the world is a wonderful place, where people learn from others’ misbehavior, this won’t happen again.
If it weren’t quite such a wonderful place, and people sometimes learn the wrong lessons, a future Patrick Pogan would just wait to write up such an, err, isolated incident until he was sure that there wasn’t a video that would come forward, or write it up in such a way that, even if there was, the fictional misbehavior that justified the takedown would have been off camera.
Which is, as you suggest, the problem that Pogan and his attorney are likely to have run up and shove the defense into a lamp pole, metaphorically. It’s a bit late for Pogan to point out that Long had just hacked a little old lady to death in passing and tossed his machete to a waiting accomplice who sped off into the crowd, as he forgot to mention such details in his report.
Ooops.
You are such a skeptic. I, on the other hand, am an idealist living in a world of cellphone videos and youtube. I have hope. I see sunshine, lollipops and rainbows (apologies to Leslie Gore).
What happened to Michael Mineo is a very different situation than what happened here. I don’t think there is anything comparable at all, though it’s unclear what aspect you are referring to when you compare the two. Regardless, the two situations are monumentally different, and bear only the most superficial similarities if any.
I understand that you’re trying to draw an analogy, but this diminshes the significance of both case, both of which involved substantial police misconduct, by attempting to compare these very insignificant similarities. These are not critical or distinguishing elements in either case. This isn’t the way to make your point, and this isn’t a good example to pursue. To rely on such trivial and superificial similarities does a disservice to your point.
The encounter shown on the video could not possibly have been the only meeting between the officer and the cyclist he knocked down, because if it were, why would he do it to that one guy and not all of them?
Clearly these officers were patrolling along the entire route of the bike ride so that each one saw the same riders several times. Therefore there’s a good chance the officer was provoked at some earlier stop, and either (a) the camera didn’t see it or (b) that part of the tape was cut out before it was published.
Should we assume the officer is telling the truth? No. Should we give him the benefit of “reasonable doubt” and thus refuse to convict him? I say yes, because these “Critical Mass” rides are done for the purpose of blocking traffic and need to be shut down. If the police *don’t* do so, then in my view they give up the right to expect motorists to behave themselves.
The encounter shown on the video could not possibly have been the only meeting between the officer and the cyclist he knocked down, because if it were, why would he do it to that one guy and not all of them?
That’s an interesting defense. As somebody who does not wish Mr. Pogan well, I’m kind of hoping that his attorney goes for it.
The problem with it is that Pogan had every opportunity to include an innocent explanation — say, he saw the guy try to chop off the head of another cop, and then throw the machete to waiting accomplice — when filling out his report.
But he didn’t. Well, I guess that could have have been an unfortunate omission, except that he very specifically said that the bicyclist had tried to ram him. (This was before he knew he had been filmed.)
That’s what’s likely to sink him; the carelessness of the lie.
And, yup, sure, the Critical Mass riders are, generally, jerks; I agree. When they’re jerks against whom there is probable cause for a cop to perform a lawful arrest, well, let him hook ’em up and haul ’em off, if he’s got nothing better to do, what with obstructing traffic being the most pressing priority in NYC, these days. That’s fine.
But I dunno . . . maybe it’s not wild-eyed anticop prejudice to think that a cop shouldn’t assault even a jerk and then try to have the jerk prosecuted for an assault against the cop that never happened.
This is why you always amaze me. You can take seriously a comment as facially ridiculous as this and try to talk reason. I don’t know how you do it.
I hang around with a lot of lawyers, politicians, and SF/fantasy writers — you know: folks in the same trade, more or less.
Ironic that you say that. My first reaction was, “on what planet?” It seriously amazes me how people can superimpose utterly baseless assumptions onto a situation, then proceed as if their alternative reality exists. And people wonder why I thing voir dire is voodoo.
I am at least a little serious; from this remove (somebody who has worked more than one of the trades would probably have a better view) there’s a lot in common with creating reasonable doubt (at least one goal, some of the time, in your trade) and creating the desire and ability for a willing suspension of disbelief (pretty much the equivalent of orgasm for an SF/fantasy writer or a politician proposing a new bill).
No, this isn’t creating reasonable doubt, but a flight of bizarre fantasy. When we try to create reasonable doubt, we are still constrained to work with facts. We can’t invent an alternate reality that flies in the face of all known facts. This was total lunacy, contrary to all known fact from all possible sources, Pogan included. That’s not how it’s done, nor the sort of thing sane people take seriously. This guy is flip city, kooby-shooby. There’s absolutely nothing there except the rantings of a lunatic.