3 NY Cops Indicted In Wedding Day Shooting
Westbound traffic on the MacArthur Causeway, approaching the Northeast 13th Street ramp, is backed up Saturday May 26, 2012, due to a man being shot to death and another wounded, in Miami. A witness said the naked man continued to chew on the face of another naked man on a Miami highway ramp and growled when a police officer tried to stop him. The victim remained hospitalized Monday. (AP Photo/The Miami Herald, Marsha Halper) MAGS OUT / Marsha Halper
Three of the five policemen whose 50-bullet barrage killed an unarmed man on his wedding day were indicted Friday in a case that heightened racial tensions and renewed allegations that the city's officers are too fast on the trigger.
Attorneys for officers Marc Cooper, Gerscard Isnora and Michael Oliver said their clients had been indicted, but they did not know what offenses the officers had been charged with. Grand jurors had considered charges including murder, manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide.
The three officers fired the most shots — Cooper, 4, Isnora, 11, and Oliver, 31 — in the Nov. 25 confrontation that killed 23-year-old Sean Bell and wounded two of his friends as they left Bell's bachelor party at a strip club in Queens.
Sources tell WCBS's Scott Weinberger that the men have been instructed to surrender Monday morning.
The shooting stirred outrage around New York City and led to accusations of racism against police. Bell was black, as are two of his friends who were wounded in the shooting. Cooper and Isnora are black. Oliver is white.
A person familiar with the case told the AP that the other two officers in the shooting — one black and one white — were not charged. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the grand jury's decision has not officially been made public.
The case also brought back painful memories of other infamous police shootings in New York City, including the 1999 killing of unarmed African immigrant Amadou Diallo, who died in a hail of 41 bullets. The officers in that case were acquitted of criminal charges.
Police union officials defended the officers, arguing they were responding to reasonable suspicions the victims were armed and dangerous.
"This indictment sends a chilling message to all New York City police officers and to all law enforcement throughout the country," said Michael Palladino, president of the Detectives' Endowment Association. "You can act in good faith and there is no margin for error."
Isnora, 28, was "very upset," attorney Philip Karasyk said. "But he is confident that once he has his day in court he will be vindicated."
The grand jury's decision came after three days of deliberations.
Anticipation has been running high around New York City about the grand jury's decision. Extra police officers were put on standby, and the mayor met with black leaders in the Queens neighborhood where the shooting occurred in hopes of defusing any tensions that might arise from the decision.
"Whatever the grand jury says ... I think you will see the people of this city behaving in an exemplary manner," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Friday. "They can be disappointed, they can express themselves — that's freedom of speech, I don't have a problem with that. But nobody is going to go out and make our streets unsafe."
Peter St. George Davis, attorney for Sean Bell's parents, said his clients are devastated. "But they pray every day that somehow, out of their son's death will come a message or lasting legacy."
The Rev. Al Sharpton said the charges marked an important first step in the fight for justice in the case.
"The only way you make sure it doesn't happen again is you stop it, and you punish it and you send a signal that we live in a society where laws have to be respected," he said. "So there is no joy, no vengeance, no party here."
A 23-person grand jury heard the case, and 12 grand jurors needed to vote for an indictment for charges to be brought. The panel included eight blacks, seven whites, and a mix of Hispanics and Asians.
Grand jurors had been instructed to consider several charges: second-degree murder, manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide stemming from Bell's death; and attempted murder, assault or reckless endangerment in the wounding of survivors Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman.
The five officers were among the more than 60 witnesses who testified before the grand jury. Survivors Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman also gave their version, insisting the officers fired without warning.
© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Attorneys for officers Marc Cooper, Gerscard Isnora and Michael Oliver said their clients had been indicted, but they did not know what offenses the officers had been charged with. Grand jurors had considered charges including murder, manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide.
The three officers fired the most shots — Cooper, 4, Isnora, 11, and Oliver, 31 — in the Nov. 25 confrontation that killed 23-year-old Sean Bell and wounded two of his friends as they left Bell's bachelor party at a strip club in Queens.
Sources tell WCBS's Scott Weinberger that the men have been instructed to surrender Monday morning.
The shooting stirred outrage around New York City and led to accusations of racism against police. Bell was black, as are two of his friends who were wounded in the shooting. Cooper and Isnora are black. Oliver is white.
District Attorney Richard A. Brown said only that the grand jury had reached a decision and it would be announced Monday. He gave no reason for the delay, but indictments are often kept sealed until attorneys and their clients are notified and arrangements can be made for the defendants to surrender.
WCBS Coverage Of Sean Bell Shooting
A person familiar with the case told the AP that the other two officers in the shooting — one black and one white — were not charged. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the grand jury's decision has not officially been made public.
The case also brought back painful memories of other infamous police shootings in New York City, including the 1999 killing of unarmed African immigrant Amadou Diallo, who died in a hail of 41 bullets. The officers in that case were acquitted of criminal charges.
Police union officials defended the officers, arguing they were responding to reasonable suspicions the victims were armed and dangerous.
"This indictment sends a chilling message to all New York City police officers and to all law enforcement throughout the country," said Michael Palladino, president of the Detectives' Endowment Association. "You can act in good faith and there is no margin for error."
Isnora, 28, was "very upset," attorney Philip Karasyk said. "But he is confident that once he has his day in court he will be vindicated."
The grand jury's decision came after three days of deliberations.
Anticipation has been running high around New York City about the grand jury's decision. Extra police officers were put on standby, and the mayor met with black leaders in the Queens neighborhood where the shooting occurred in hopes of defusing any tensions that might arise from the decision.
"Whatever the grand jury says ... I think you will see the people of this city behaving in an exemplary manner," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Friday. "They can be disappointed, they can express themselves — that's freedom of speech, I don't have a problem with that. But nobody is going to go out and make our streets unsafe."
Peter St. George Davis, attorney for Sean Bell's parents, said his clients are devastated. "But they pray every day that somehow, out of their son's death will come a message or lasting legacy."
The Rev. Al Sharpton said the charges marked an important first step in the fight for justice in the case.
"The only way you make sure it doesn't happen again is you stop it, and you punish it and you send a signal that we live in a society where laws have to be respected," he said. "So there is no joy, no vengeance, no party here."
A 23-person grand jury heard the case, and 12 grand jurors needed to vote for an indictment for charges to be brought. The panel included eight blacks, seven whites, and a mix of Hispanics and Asians.
Grand jurors had been instructed to consider several charges: second-degree murder, manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide stemming from Bell's death; and attempted murder, assault or reckless endangerment in the wounding of survivors Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman.
The five officers were among the more than 60 witnesses who testified before the grand jury. Survivors Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman also gave their version, insisting the officers fired without warning.
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He/she is an uninformed, insane, rascist, ignorant, freakshow!
There's a huge difference between freedon of speech and the cr@p that this person has been typing.
Humancitizen, go back to the hole you slithered out of, you scumbucket.
Humanmanure is a relic, an aborigine that needs to placed into a solution of formaldehyde and given to anthropologists/scientist for further examination and research to determine why she defied Darwin%u2019s theory of evolution.
This "genetic deformity" is also a teacher, so you don't have to wonder why America's children have fallen so far behind academically in comparison to other countries.
And what I find amusing individuals such as it are allowed to viciously spout racist garbage, while some are being censored for telling the truth.
Posted by humancitizen at 09:25 PM : Mar 17, 2007"'
Anything for you, humanwaste! LOL
Posted by humancitizen at 08:49 PM : Mar 17, 2007"
Yes!
The Jews are 'most shining': They have idiots like your kind surrendering lives, heads and limbs in Iraq on a ruse and their religious rubbish! Dam (one child left behind) dunce! LOL
Posted by humancitizen at 07:58 PM : Mar 17, 2007"
LOL
Considering that for centuries in America your ******* were robbed of life, labor, liberty, future for their descendants, etc, etc, your ******* DO now deserve to sit around and be paid for centuries, yes? LOL
No free lunch as we say in America, right? LOL
It's called INESCAPABLE KARMA!
So shut the **** up and pay up bi-a-itch! LOL
Posted by george2221 at 01:39 PM : Mar 17, 2007"
ALL should have been indicted and ALL should be convicted of MURDER!
What is going on with this indictment is POLITICS not justice!
Give the Black community a white murderer to pacify them.
And give the white supremacist community two Blacks to pacify and make things seem more 'even'.
SOUNDS FAMILIAR to the good old days when ...? LOL
5 Blacks = 3 white men?
Only today the Black man has even less value than the white man in New York.
Maybe the murderous NY police value a bit more? LOL
Imagine that a dam murderer values even more than an innocent person! Tsk-tsk
The issue here is POLICE BRUTALITY. Clearly, you do not know the history of the United States during slavery. There were plenty blacks who did AWFUL things to other blacks during this time (the house slave vs. the field slave). A black police officer being BRUTAL is no better than a white police officer being BRUTAL.
I'm not sure how often you speak to the black community, but take this as a lesson from one of said community.
No justice?
No peace!
Without the likes of Sharpton to focus local and national attention on the bunch of bigoted thugs that is the New York police, then those racist murderers will continue to feel at liberty to lynch Black people in New York behind a badge, instead of behind their usual kkk white sheet!
Some people have nothing else better to do than to spew their vile malignancy.