A city oversight agency on Friday sharply criticized the New York Police Department’s handling of protests during the summer, finding that the police were undertrained, were unprepared and had engaged in “excessive enforcement” that only heightened tensions with demonstrators. In a 111-page report, the city’s Department of Investigation determined that some police officers used aggressive tactics that violated the First Amendment rights of protesters as the department made mass arrests during the demonstrations, which followed the death of George Floyd, a Black man, at the hands of the Minneapolis police. The report also criticized Mayor Bill de Blasio and the Police Department for taking actions that exacerbated already fraught tensions with protesters, who gathered by the thousands in May and June to protest police brutality and racism. More than 2,000 people were arrested, most of them while protesting peacefully. “Some police officers engaged in actions that were, at a minimum, unprofessional and, at worst, unjustified excessive force or abuse of authority,” the report said.

Source: New York Times December 18, 2020 14:37 UTC