Marathon Pundit: NYPD officer attacked with pipe, three occupiers arrested; chanted "cops are murders"

Sunday, April 15, 2012

NYPD officer attacked with pipe, three occupiers arrested; chanted "cops are murders"

Another 'mostly peaceful' protest in New York City...

First from Metro News:

Three men, at least one of which is associated with Occupy Wall Street, tried to smash in the windows of the Starbucks at Astor Place and Lafayette Street at about 8:45 p.m. Saturday.

According to police, the men were part of a larger pack of 25 people who tried to use eight-foot-long galvanized metal pipes to break the windows of the coffee shop. Terrified patrons hid under the tables, scared that glass would fall in on them.

The men attended an anarchist book fair earlier, said police, and took to the streets near Washington Square Park, marching against traffic and chanting, "f... the NYPD", "cops are murderers," and "all pigs must die."

A group of about 150 people, some of them masked, also tipped garbage cans and spray-painted anarchist symbols on commercial premises in the neighborhood.

As I've noted many times before, the Occupy movement is very quick to disassociate themselves from their members who get in serious trouble. It won't work this time, as you will learn in the Gothamist:

According to police, the two men [the Gothamist only reported on the two busts] who were arrested in front of the Sixth Street Community Center last night allegedly assaulted an NYPD sergeant with a metal pipe in front of the Starbucks on Astor Place. One of the men, 41-year-old Alexander Penley, is an attorney and has been an Occupy Wall Street organizer since the movement began in the fall.

Penley, along with 30-year-old Nicholas Thommen, were arrested around 10 p.m. after what witnesses described as a violent scuffle between the two men and police officers, and are charged with a litany of offenses, including assaulting a police officer, menacing, criminal possession of a weapon, resisting arrest, and inciting a riot.

Penley has been quoted in stories about Occupy Wall Street in The Guardian and USA Today, and appeared on the local Manhattan television show Let Them Talk in October.

Weasel Zippers has more on Penley. Oh, Penley possibly has the the worst legal web site on the planet. I thought these occupiers were computer whizzes...

UPDATE 11:00pm: Amidst countless 'ums' and 'you knows," watch can watch a bearded Penley slouch and cross his arms for nearly a half hour for what appears to be a cable access show that aired in October.

It's hard to believe this guy is an attorney, let alone a graduate of Case Western Reserve's law school.

Just what are Occupy Wall Street's demands? "Forgive all mortgage debt, forgive student loans, and change the law of corporate personhood [Citizens United Case]," Penley says here.