Couple handcuffed, jailed for dancing on subway platform: lawsuit (New York City)

NY Post ^ | july 8, 2012 | KATHIANNE BONIELLO

[lowbridge]

First smoking, then soda — now there’s no dancing in New York City.

Caroline Stern, 55, and her boyfriend George Hess, 54, claim they were handcuffed for having happy feet on the platform of the Columbus Circle subway station — and spent 23 hours in custody as a result.

“I’m a dentist, and I’m 55, and I got arrested for dancing,” Stern told The Post. “It was absolutely ridiculous that this happened.”

[nathanbedford]

Giuliani was tough but fair. These people are self-worshipping power junkies.

Yes that is very true and these left wing tyrants deserve every ounce of condemnation they get. But the story is more than that.

New York City is a place where there concentrated population density. Put rats in a confined place and they begin to turn on each other resulting in aggressive behavior. If you think of New York City as a giant Skinner box and Mayor Bloomberg the wizard operating the levers which deliver the rewards to the rats in the box, it is inevitable that he will try as he has to manipulate and control behavior. He will tell the rats what kind of pellets they can eat, and he will tell them when and where they can dance. He will cease being a Mayor and start being a wizard.

But the analogy to the Skinner box breaks down because Mayor Bloomberg does not have absolute control, he must insinuate his police force in among the the rats to quell the aggression and impose the kind of control his ambition desires. When you have a police force bigger than the Coast Guard and when you have 8 million people interacting with that large a police force, bizarre situations are going to erupt. Inevitably, the aggressive behavior of the rats, even the harmless but bizarre behavior of the rats is going to generate within that police force an us against them mentality.

Now Mayor Bloomberg is forced to choose between his established order and common sense, he must choose whether to support the culture of his bureaucratic institutions without which a city of 8 million people will degenerate into an extremely uncivil society. With 8 million people there is an institutional bias towards the institution's culture and against commonsense. If you have millions of those 8 million people who are not culturally assimilated to begin with, whose religion is different, whose language is different, whose idea of morality is different, whose idea of the rule of law is different, and whose respect for the rule of law is vastly different, we will see aggravated every tension among the rats themselves and by the rats against the institution.

By the way, if you want to generate a nice argument on these threads take up my position that overpopulation, or density of population, is itself a threat to a civil society, to a society protected by the Bill of Rights, a society that we conservatives treasure and whose agonizing death by 1000 cuts we are witnessing.

[MARTIAL MONK]

Bloomberg is a Baptist?

[RegulatorCountry]

Giuliani was tough but fair. These people are self-worshipping power junkies.

Surprise at the leftist abuse of authoritarian powers created under an erstwhile conservative is a recurring theme, it would seem. DHS, anyone?

[HotKat]

Does one need an ID to travel on NYC subway now?

[kingu]

When Hess began trying to film the encounter, things got ugly, Stern said.

And there it is, the gem of the encounter - citizens get sick and tired of being bullied, pull out the camera so others can see how insane it is, and they get tackled by the cops. Interestingly there's nothing said as to what happened to the footage - wonder if it was confiscated for evidence, or accidentally deleted like such things happen so often. Hope the couple when they filed their lawsuit sent out a subpoena for the footage from the platform cameras.

And 23 hours in custody?? Wasn't there, but don't particularly care what was apparently said by the couple. If the cops wanted to be jerks and tell the couple to stop dancing on an empty platform, that was the entire limit of the encounter. Anything beyond that is pure abuse of power.

[hal ogen]

Do something spontaneous that may indicate you’re happy???? How dare you. We must all be subjugated and miserable together, Comrade.

[Popman]

The cops asked for ID, but when Stern could only produce a credit card, the officers ordered the couple to go with them — even though the credit card had the dentist’s picture and signature. When Hess began trying to film the encounter, things got ugly, Stern said.

“We brought out the camera, and that’s when they called backup,” she said. “That’s when eight ninja cops came from out of nowhere.”

Hess was allegedly tackled to the platform floor, and cuffs were slapped on both of them. The initial charge, according to Stern, was disorderly conduct for “impeding the flow of traffic.”

Want to really piss off a cop....whole them accountable by recording their behavior...

I guess the cops thought intimation would work...

[Oratam]

In Bloonberg’s New York, are you required to possess a permit to dance? It would be more revenue. sarc/

Yes. It's called a Cabaret License.

[Jeff Vader]

if you’re going to be doing something as important as going to vote I wold imagine you’d expect to be carded and plan accordingly. I know I would.

[Truth29]

"if you’re going to be doing something as important as going to vote I wold imagine you’d expect to be carded and plan accordingly. I know I would."

According to Democrats, that should be almost the least likely place to require an ID.

[Roccus]

Lived in Fun City for 57 years, from LaGuardia to Bloomberg. IMO, from my experiences there, the ingrained “us against them” mentality of the NYPD toward the citizenry dates to the Lindsay (R) administration.

[atc23]

It was this man, he started it.

[Rome2000]

Anybody venturing into NYC deserves everything that happens to them.

If the crooks don't get you, the cops and the City Apparatchiks certainly will.

[bgill]

Ten bucks says they both voted for Doomberg...and Osama! And ten more bucks says they'll continue so to do.

You know it.

[miss marmelstein]

Yeah, like most Manhattan bicylists (especially messengers), they are some of the most dangerous people in the city.

[miss marmelstein]

Yeah, like most Manhattan bicylists (especially messengers), they are some of the most dangerous people in the city.

[MinuteGal]

DANCIN' BY THE TRAIN

Doo-dle-doo-doo
Doo-dle-doo-dle-doo-doo
Doo-dle-doo-dle-doo-doo
Doo-dle-doo-dle-doo-doo.....

We're dancin' by the train
Just dancin' by the train
What a glorious feeling
We're happy again
Along come the cops
With stormy face mugs
They busted our chops
Like commonplace thugs
Well, let the storm troopers chase
Everyone from the place
Next chance that we get
We'll do it again
We'll sing a happy refrain
Where's muh top hat and cane?
Let's go singin'
And dancin'
By the train

Leni

[atc23]

Anybody venturing into NYC deserves everything that happens to them

Really?

[Hardraade]

Dancing is Forbidden. - Taliban

[miss marmelstein]

Yes, but we rats get to see the greatest opera companies in the world, the finest theatre in the world, ballet, film, museum and art galleries and the most amazing restaurants and shops. It can be heaven as well as hell.