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Handcuff me to the Constitution
A graduate student in the MD/PhD program at Columbia University was handcuffed and held on a NYC street by police last summer. (I've been there before, handcuffed on the street. It is humiliating.) Why? A NYPD officer observed 26-year-old Arun Wiita standing on the sidewalk at 207th Street and 10th Avenue. Wiita was taking pictures with a point-and-shoot digital camera.
Well, he was taking pictures while brown.
The officer and two plainclothes police officers took Wiita's camera and invaded his privacy by reviewing his pictures. He was publicly interrogated. Because the NYPD has a colorful history of harassing photographers and video makers and violating their First Amendment rights, the New York Civil Liberties Union recently filed a lawsuit in federal court on behalf of Wiita.
"I was surprised and upset that I could be handcuffed on the street for taking a photograph," Arun Wiita said in a NYCLU press release. "What was really disheartening was that I knew this had probably happened before and that it could happen again to anyone."
The City of New York seems to have issues with people's right to carry hand-held cameras and use them in public areas. You can catch up with the issue at Picture New York, or at a blog I wrote soon after the latest set of regulations were proposed by the Mayor's Office of Film, Theatre & Broadcasting (MOFTB). In fact, there's a public hearing on the issue tomorrow, and I'm testifying.
Well, he was taking pictures while brown.
The officer and two plainclothes police officers took Wiita's camera and invaded his privacy by reviewing his pictures. He was publicly interrogated. Because the NYPD has a colorful history of harassing photographers and video makers and violating their First Amendment rights, the New York Civil Liberties Union recently filed a lawsuit in federal court on behalf of Wiita.
"I was surprised and upset that I could be handcuffed on the street for taking a photograph," Arun Wiita said in a NYCLU press release. "What was really disheartening was that I knew this had probably happened before and that it could happen again to anyone."
The City of New York seems to have issues with people's right to carry hand-held cameras and use them in public areas. You can catch up with the issue at Picture New York, or at a blog I wrote soon after the latest set of regulations were proposed by the Mayor's Office of Film, Theatre & Broadcasting (MOFTB). In fact, there's a public hearing on the issue tomorrow, and I'm testifying.
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