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On Friday night, the Westchester police shot at a Mount Vernon police officer brandishing a gun in front of a county social services building. The policeman killed was Christopher Ridley, who was off-duty at the time; now it turns out he had been trying to break up a brawl. more ›

The three undercover police detectives facing trial in the death of Sean Bell waived their right to a jury trial, after unsuccessfully attempting to move the trial out of Queens. Bell was killed early on the morning of his wedding, as he left the Kalua stripclub in Queens with friends. They had been celebrating Bell's impending nuptials while undercover cops were simultaneously conducting an investigation into the illegal gun trade. more ›

May 29, 2007 was the last time Stepha Henry, a John Jay honors graduate, was seen. The Brooklyn resident had been visiting an aunt in Miami when she went missing and as months went on, her mother quit her job and moved to Florida to search for Stepha while John Jay classmates and faculty held fund-raisers to help the family. Today, Miami-Dade detectives, along with members of the NYPD, arrested a man in New York for killing Henry. more ›

One of the NJ prisoners who escaped from a Union County jail by chiseling through cement blocks (hiding their progress by taping posters over the growing hole) three weeks ago was captured last night. Thanks to a tip, police found Jose Espinosa in an apartment just a few blocks away from the jail. more ›

The three police officers facing trial for the November 2006 shooting of an unarmed man are requesting to their trial moved from Queens. Lawyers for Michael Oliver, Gescard Isnora, and Marc Cooper claim they won't be able to get a fair trial in Queens, blaming media attention for "incurably poison[ing]" any potential jury pool. more ›

The Reverend Al Sharpton organized a rally of about 400 people outside the Suffolk County courthouse to protest the conviction of a black homeower in a white teen's death. They chanted, "Step down, DA, step down, DA" as well as "Free John White! Free John White!" more ›

A week has passed after a Long Island jury found John White guilty of manslaughter, but details of what happened in the jury room and talk of an appeal continues. more ›

Beginning at 10:30PM last night and through 5AM this morning, family, friend and other supporters gathered in Queens to remember Sean Bell, the 25-year-old man who was shot by undercover police the night before his wedding a year ago. Bell's fiancee, Nicole Paultre-Bell, told the crowd, "I want justice, but no matter what happens, it won't bring Sean back." more ›

On November 25, 2006, groom-to-be Sean Bell and his friends were leaving the Kalua nightclub in Queens when undercover police confronted them. In the confusion that ensued (the police thinking the men were armed or were going to the car to retrieve a gun, uncertainty over whether the police identified themselves leading Bell and his friends to think they were being carjacked) five undercover cops fired 50 times at Bell's car. His friends Joseph... more ›

The second 911 call between police shooting victim Khiel Coppin's mother and a 911 operator seems to suggests some misinformation. Coppin's mother Denise Owens claimed she told the 911 operator who called her back that her son did not have a gun. Here's an excerpt (you can read the transcript here and hear it here) of the call at 7:05PM, 14 minutes before police shot at 18-year-old Coppin 20 times: Female: Hello Operator: Hi Maam... more ›

One less headache for Knicks coach and General Manager Isiah Thomas and Madison Square Garden: The Reverend Al Sharpton has called off his boycott and protest of Knicks games. Now, if only the Knicks can convince their fan base all is not lost! Last month, a jury believed former Knicks marketing VP Anucha Browne-Sanders' allegations that Thomas and Madison Square created hostile work environment and awarded her $11.6 million. Thomas said, during an 11-minute... more ›

Police officer Sean Sawyer was released and not charged after confessing to shooting an unarmed man in Harlem during a road argument early Sunday morning. The Manhattan DA's office claimed that Sawyer could have been acting in self-defense, because the other driver, Jayson Tirado, suggested he had a gun when he gestured and yelled at Sawyer. DA Robert Morgenthau said the "case is under investigation and is going to go to a grand jury. When there's a claim of self-defense, there is no immediate arrest." more ›

The Reverend Al Sharpton, speaking out against the beating a black man in Staten Island, announced that he will organize a protest march in the next few weeks. He said, "New York is becoming worse than Louisiana. We're going to Staten Island, Jena, Washington - and we're going to bring out numbers like you've never seen before." more ›

The police arrested two white men in the the beating of a black man in Staten Island. The Reverend Al Sharpton appeared with the victim and said, "We cannot live in a city, state or nation where people cannot safely be in the streets or anywhere else because of the color of their skin." more ›

That medical condition Paris Hilton had that led the LA County Sheriff to release her from jail? The Daily News reports that the socialite was worried guards would take a photograph of her using her jail cell bathroom and then put it on the Internet. From a Hilton insider who spoke to the News:

"She didn't eat or drink a single thing for three days because she didn't want to use the toilet. She was in real danger." more ›

This morning, NBC News President Steve Capus appeared on the Today show to discuss the immediate ending of radio shock jock Don Imus's MSNBC simulcast. Per TVNewser, Capus said:

There's no question that his program has had provocative conversation and interesting conversation, deep conversation with thought leaders and political leaders through the years. But it's also had the other element. At some point you have to say 'enough is enough.' This went so far over the line that it was time.

The Reverend Al Sharpton held a press conference criticizing violence in the hip-hop community. The press conference was prompted by the alleged assault on the 14-year-old child of a rap music management company headed by G-Unit rapper Tony Yayo; apparently seeing the child wear a Czar Entertainment shirt on 25th Street sent him over the edge. more ›

The Reverend Al Sharpton, who has been representing the family of police shooting victim Sean Bell, weighed in about the taxi driver who Bell shooting cop Michael Oliver allegedly assaulted 12 years ago. Sharpton held a press conference, where he said that revelations about Oliver show that's he's "inappropriate at best, and biased and racist at worst." more ›

Three detectives were charged in the November 2006 shooting of Sean Bell outside a Queens nightclub, and all three pleaded not guilty. Two of the police officers, Detectives Michael Oliver and Gescard Isnora, face serious charges that include first-degree and second-degree manslaughter (it was originally thought they would only face second-degree manslaughter), while Detective Marc Cooper faces charges of reckless endangerment. When asked how he would plea, Isnora's lawyer Philip Karasyk said, "Not guilty of each and every count of the indictment." more ›

At 7AM, the three detectives indicted in the shooting of Sean Bell last November turned themselves. WNBC reports that Michael Oliver, Gescard Isnora, and Marc Cooper will be fingerprinted and processed before their arraignment this afternoon. more ›

Yesterday, a grand jury decided to indict three detectives in the shooting of Sean Bell, an unarmed black man who had been celebrating the night before his wedding day at a Queens nightclub. The charges were manslaughter for Gescard Isnora and Michael Oliver and reckless endangerment for Marc Cooper. Isnora fired the first shot, one of 11 he eventually fired, while Oliver fired the most, 31 rounds. Cooper fired 4 times; in total, the police shot at Bell and his two friends 50 times. Two other officers, Michael Carey and Paul Headley, were called to testify but were not charged. A Fordham Law professor told Newsday that the grand jury's decision to charge three cops and clear two others "suggested [the grand jury was] careful." more ›

Update: The NYPD will have to be on alert on Monday now? Earlier, WNBC reported that the grand jury investigating the fatal police shooting of Sean Bell has reached a verdict but will wait until Monday to release it. But now a defense lawyer says the jury voted to indict three of the detectives involved: Michael Oliver who fired 31 shots, Gescard F. Isnora who fired the first of 11 shots, and Marc Cooper. Cooper's lawyer Paul Martin said, "I am disappointed with the grand jury’s decision but this is just the first stage of a long process and I am confident that once all the facts are considered by a jury of Detective Cooper’s peers, that he will be exonerated of all charges." more ›

The first day of grand jury deliberations in the Sean Bell shooting case ended without a verdict, but a new witness may have emerged. more ›

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: A power outage in Beach Channel, Queens, a jumper on the George Washington Bridge, and a pedestrian struck near Tottenville High School on Staten Island
• It's damn cold, but you should be warm(ish) at home; building owners are required to provide heat and hot water during "heat season"
• The doctor who claimed he had been attacked by a group of thugs died and the medical examiner isn't sure how he died; earlier hypotheses included a gay encounter gone wrong and, the current one, that he may have scalded himself

As the City Council continues to look at police-supplied data showing blacks are stopped 55% of the time during stop-and-frisk searches, the community has startled to rumble. The Reverend Al Sharpton said that he would start collecting names to file a class action lawsuit against the city. He asid, "It's an outrage. It's enough. No matter how productive you are, to be cast as a suspect rather than a citizen is intolerable in this country... One will have to explain how 55% of the people stopped are black when we're not nearly 50% of the population." more ›

"It was the comb-over! I said to myself, Why couldn't his wife tell him how stupid that is? So he's bald. I'm happy that he's "listened" to me [Mr. Giuliani has abandoned his comb-over for a more conventional style.] Now his only impediment is a speech defect, his lisp."Fun fact: Former public advocate Mark Green lived on the floor below Giuliani in the 1980s. more ›

After criticism about the NYPD's trigger finger, police spokesman Paul Browne says the NYPD is not at the top of cities with deadly police force. In fact, LA, Houston, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Miami have had more than NYC's 13 fatal police shootings, which is interesting given that NYC is the biggest city. Then again, we don't live in those cities for many reasons. From the Daily News:

In the 1990s, New York had an average of 25 people fatally shot by cops every year, but those numbers are down dramatically. more ›

The Reverend Al Sharpton announced the "shopping for justice" protest march he's been talking about since the shooting of Sean Bell, Joseph Guzman, and Trent Benefield by the police.

"Many will be shopping for trinkets and toys. We will be shopping for justice and making a moral appeal to this city and this nation. The fact that we are going on probably the most visible street in the world tomorrow, you don't have to talk to be heard. You just got to show up."