8/20/2019 2016-3-3 Edrei v NYC Press Release

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ERIC GARNER PROTESTERS AND JOURNALISTS SUE NEW YORK CITY

POLICE DEPARTMENT OVER 2014 LRAD SOUND WEAPON ATTACKS,

COMMISSIONER BRATTON’S RATIFICATION OF THEM

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

New York, New YorkMarch 3, 2016

Contacts: Gideon Orion OliverEmail – Gideon@Gideonlaw.com 

Cell - 646–263-3495

Elena L. Cohen

Email – ElenaCohenESQ@gmail.com 

Phone – 203-541-0617

On December 5, 2014, Anika Edrei, Shay Horse, James Clover, Keegan Stephan,

and Michael Nusbaum were participating in or observing and documenting New YorkCity protests against police brutality in the wake of a December 2014 Staten Island Grand

Jury’s decision not to indict New York City Police Department (“NYPD”) Officer DanielPantaleo in the death of Eric Garner, and police response to those protests, when two

 NYPD officers injured them with a Long Range Acoustic Device (“LRAD”) soundweapon.

On March 3, 2016, they filed a federal civil rights lawsuit in the United States

District Court for the Southern District of New York against the City of New York, NYPD Commissioner William Bratton, and those two officers, claiming assault and

 battery, violations of their Fourth Amendment and First Amendment rights, and other

injuries. The Complaint in the case, Edrei, et al. v. Bratton, et al.,

16-cv-01652 (SDNY2016), attaches and refers to copies of a 2010 NYPD Disorder Control Unit Briefingabout LRADs and a December 2014 letter from the lawyers to Commissioner Bratton

explaining how the LRAD had been used improperly in 2014 to injure their clients andasking that the NYPD conduct proper testing and adopt proper standards, training, and

supervision for LRAD use and operation.

The protester, photojournalist, videographer, and film-maker plaintiffs arerepresented by civil rights attorneys Gideon Orion Oliver (www.gideonlaw.com) and

Elena L. Cohen, both past Presidents of the New York City Chapter of the NationalLawyers Guild (http://www.nlgnyc.org). The lawyers said the NYPD had ignored their

letter. “Instead of responding to our letter in 2014 by writing, publishing, and training police in appropriate guidelines for LRAD use, since then, the NYPD has chosen the

more dangerous course of refusing to draw and enforce bright lines about when and howLRADs can be used, all the while using LRADs to prevent and chill protected conduct on

the streets,” said Cohen.

A copy of the Complaint and attachments are available upon request.##