In his new book, NYPD Confidential, Levitt follows the rise and fall of former Police Commissioners Lee Brown, Bill Bratton, Howard Safir and the now-disgraced Bernie Kerik. read more »

City councilmember Letitia James talks to activists and reporters about the importance of keeping the Pacific-Dean homeless shelter open. PHOTO CREDIT: Tracy Collins About twenty people gathered to protest the city’s decision to shut down a homeless shelter on Dean Street in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn this past Monday night. Chanting “Governor Paterson, hear our roars, house the [...] read more »

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In Obama’s version of help, the predatory lender gets subsidized by his individual victim and, by you, the taxpayer. read more »

Barack Obama has promised to revise or reverse many Bush administration policies on everything from the environment to workplace safety to reproductive rights. Will he renounce the vast expansion of executive authority that Bush claimed gave the president near monarchical powers over the lives of mere mortals? read more »

When the videotape shot by a tourist who happened to be standing on 7th Avenue, between 46th and 47th streets, went viral on YouTube, it not only raised questions about the honesty of one 22-year-old rookie cop, but also of the entire culture of dishonesty that pervades the New York Police Department. read more »

In January, Sen. Barack Obama (DIll.) vowed to join a filibuster against legislation that would grant immunity to telecommunication companies who participated in President Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program for years. read more »

The MCA created kangaroo courts that deny access to counsel; deny the right to see and cross-examine witnesses, that permit evidence obtained by torture if the government deems it reliable, and worst of all, don’t provide for the release from detention even if you prove you are not an enemy combatant. read more »

Queens District Attorney Richard Brown is responsible for the sham trial that resulted in the acquittal on all charges of the three trigger-happy cops who pumped 50 bullets into Sean Bell’s car and its surroundings. read more »

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said he supported the bill purely to show bipartisan support for the executive in the aftermath of the attacks. “Is it overkill?,” he was asked after the bill passed in 2001. “It may very well be overkill, but at this time I think it’s important to show the unity of our purpose and not question political motives.” read more »

It essentially creates a national identity card for the first time in U.S. history, as it requires states to verify the “issuance, validity and completeness“ of every document presented in order to obtain a driver’s license. Future licenses are supposed to have a “machine-readable zone” allowing them to be swiped at airports, federal facilities and anywhere else authorities choose to mandate. read more »

In passing the “Protect America Act of 2007,” Congress gave in to President Bush and legalized his warrantless wiretapping without ever learning the full extent of the illegal program. read more »

For now, what this Court deems political speech, and therefore worth protecting, depends more on the resources of the speaker than the content of his or her opinion. The satirical spirit of “Bong Hits for Jesus” is no match for the mischievousness of the Supreme Court’s humorless majority. read more »

Many of these books can be found in the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, W. 135th St. and Malcolm X Blvd. Try also Revolution Books, 9 W. 19th St., and indigocafe.com. read more »

“Pan-Africanism means to me the unity of all people of African descent, in Africa and throughout the world; a desire to see Africa united as one continent as Kwame Nkrumah theorized it — the united States of Africa; and to ensure that the resources are distributed and shared more equally.” —Joan Gibbs, General Counsel to The Center for Law and Social Justice at Medgar Evers College read more »

After three years and eight months of solitary confinement in a naval brig, Jose Padilla will finally receive his day in court. Gone are charges that he planned to set off a radioactive “dirty bomb.” read more »

Despite efforts to mask its spying activity, the city has not just been videotaping demonstrators, but has also placed infiltrators in groups around the world in advance of the 2004 Republican National Convention, leaked documents show. read more »

Officer Michael Oliver, who fired 31 shots, has said he will testify before the grand jury, but he wants to be the last, following an expected 40 to 50 witnesses. Perhaps he is hoping that some of that secret testimony will leak out to his advantage. read more »

Why hasn’t District Attorney Brown interviewed all of the officers involved in the shooting of Sean Bell on Nov. 25? The only explanation is that the DA lacks the political will to scrutinize the conduct of the officers of the NYPD. Assistant district attorneys rely on cops each and every day to determine what charges to bring and to help them prove their cases. Prosecutors are reluctant to bite the hand that feeds them information, especially as they become emotionally invested in a case. read more »

What do you get when two people jaywalk together? A parade, according to proposed NYPD rules made public July 18. The rules were evidently issued in response to judicial criticism that the NYPD’s attempts to shut down Critical Mass bike rides relied on a vaguely worded statute governing public protests and parades. read more »

Ms. Spruill was a 57-year-old city employee who died of a heart attack on May 16, 2003, after police, acting on a bad tip, threw a concussion grenade into her apartment on W.143rd St. Police had an affidavit from a confidential informant that a crack dealer lived in her apartment. It turned out the dealer was already in custody. The police did not bother themselves to go to her building and speak to its residents prior to the raid. read more »

For New York students, the ban on cell phones in school may feel like an infringement on their right to free expression. Well-to-do parents insist it’s an issue of physical safety and want to be able to check on their children’s whereabouts throughout the day. Leaving alone for the moment the legitimate pedagogical concerns of [...] read more »

"The government has consistently exaggerated the importance of each alleged terrorist it has tried to prosecute, only to see its claims fall far short when they are subjected to the scrutiny of the judicial system." read more »

“There are more laws permitting pharmacists to refuse to fulfill a birth control prescription than there are members of Pharmacists for Life.” read more »

How could the administration insist it needed legal authorization from the PATRIOT Act to fight terrorism when it had authority under the FISA it wasn’t bothering to invoke? read more »

Right now, the rule is often violated, especially in the Bronx. A study by the NYCLU, proponent of the measure, found that more than half of all people arrested are arraigned more than 24 hours after being picked up. Because people of color are three-fourths of all those arrested in the city, it is a matter of racial justice that processing be done swiftly enough to comply with the 24-hour rule, which was mandated by the state Court of Appeals in 1991. read more »

Suspension of constitutional liberties in the name of national security and the “war on terror” is fashionable not only in Washington, D.C., but right here in our city. read more »

Only moments after hearing closing arguments in a two-day bench trial, U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman issued a 41-page opinion on Dec. 2 ruling that random, suspicionless subway searches are constitutional. read more »

Doherty is caught saying to former U.S. Senator Alphonse D’Amato, “Just between you and me, if the fucking commissioners of this state were any slower with this shit, I mean it got to a point where I called [then-Health Commissioner Barbara] DeBuono on something on behalf of [Nassau County Republican boss Joseph] Mondello, and I said to her, ‘You know you have a fucking Democrat as your No. 2 person, and you’re telling me that I can’t get my fucking people hired?’ read more »

The real intention of the energy bill was to revive the nuclear industry and to repeal PUHCA, a law that prevented utility mergers, and for seven decades kept consumer energy costs in the U.S. lower than in European countries. In addition, the bill provided $2.9 billion for the coal industry and $2.6 billion for oil and gas companies, and what Public Citizen called “cradle-to-grave subsidies for the nuclear industry.” read more »

Ah, the delicious irony of Mark Felt’s career! The man who denounced the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) “interfering with government work” and “helping criminals,” becomes, through his misdeeds, the spur for a generation of laws strengthening public oversight of the Executive Branch of government. read more »

The patient work of videographer Eileen Clancy of I-Witness Video, led last month to proof that someone in the District Attorney’s office edited a video of Alexander Dunlop, who was arrested as he was going to get sushi. read more »

The National Lawyers Guild is eagerly preparing for a March 28 contempt hearing that will be the first courtroom exploration of the city’s justification for holding hundreds of people in detention as long as 40 hours after their arrests during last summer’s Republican National Convention (RNC). read more »

The conviction of Lynne Stewart threatens the right to counsel. The govenment is bent on intimidating attorneys who provide zealous representation to unpopular clients. read more »

John Ashcroft has decided to pass the baton of U.S. Attorney General, but the impact of his tenure leaves many questions. In a federal courtroom at 40 Centre Street in downtown Manhattan, the ongoing trial of longtime civil rights lawyer Lynne Stewart may answer one question: can the government undermine such basic legal rights as the confidentiality of attorney-client relations? read more »

The First Department Appellate Division last week dismissed an attempt by protesters to prevent judges from unsealing prior Adjournment in Contemplation of Dismissals (ACDs) and using them for sentencing on a current offense. The decision is a major setback for the hundreds of Republican National Convention (RNC) arrestees who may have accepted an ACD on some prior civil disobedience. read more »

In the case of the 600 Guantanamo detainees, 14 plaintiffs represented by the Center for Constitutional Rights established their right to appear in U.S. courts to challenge their detentions. The ruling was 6-3, with William Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas dissenting. Writing for the majority, Justice John Paul Stevens rejected the government’s argument that U.S. courts have no authority over what goes on in Guantanamo because it is located on Cuban soil. read more »

In recent hearings for the extension of the rent control and rent stabilization laws, tenants demanded the repeal of a notoriously anti-democratic 1971 state statute, known as the Urstadt Law, which removed rent laws from home rule and required any change in rent statutes to be voted upon in Albany. Ironically, in the final hours of this summer’s legislative session, the Urstadt Law was actually strengthened to the detriment of New York City tenants. read more »

Then came the revelation of this form. It corroborated activists’ accounts that they had been questioned by police about their political beliefs, an obviously unconstitutional practice. It also undercut the city’s constant refrain, “Trust us. Look how good we’ve been in the past.” read more »