Pretty wild video for you right here, folks.
Jason Salters was working as the shift supervisor at the Renaissance Shelter in Crown Heights back in February when a group of NYPD officers arrived looking for a domestic violence suspect who may have been housed there.
Salters told them they couldn't come in without a warrant, and even called an NYC director of social services, who confirmed, on speaker phone for the police, that they needed a warrant. But this was apparently not enough to persuade them.
He offered to go try to convince the client to come down, but the officers insisted on entering, Salters said. Eventually, one of them got through a door and got closer to the dormitory area, so Salters said he held the door to try to keep the others out.
He said the video shows an officer ‘basically telling me to step aside.'
Eventually, the officers broke through the door Salters was holding shut, and what happened next is just awful.
[Warning: Violence]
Completely unnecessary. Dude was just following orders from his superior.
But then there's this, a little twist in the story:
CBS News New York Investigates reviewed other DHS documents that state officers could enter in some circumstances with a document called an investigative card, or 'I-Card.' The DHS report on the incident shows the officers presented an I-Card that morning, but Salters said he'd never heard of that, which is why he called that social services director.
So apparently if they show an I-Card they're good to go, no warrant necessary. Salters says he was confused by the card and that the whole system needs to be revamped.
Salters was set to be charged with obstruction and resisting arrest, but those charges were dropped shortly after he received them. I mean, NYPD beat him up, so I can see why they dropped those charges.
A little more from the story:
The city's Civilian Complaint Review Board says it is investigating what happened to Salters.
The DHS report says, after the officers handcuffed Salters, they searched the shelter and did not find the suspect.
In response to a lawsuit filed by Salters, the city's lawyers wrote that the officers' actions were ‘justified as being reasonably necessary,' within the scope of their employment but the city didn't provide any specifics on what made the officers react that way.
"Justified as being reasonably necessary"?!?!?!
We'll see what the courts think about that one!
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