Last July Gothamist broke the story about the Hasidic cop who allegedly told a dog-toting straphanger, "If you're going to act like a woman I'm going to treat you like a woman" as he handcuffed her and allegedly grabbed her breasts. The next day, the Post spun the story 180 degrees with a statement from a mysterious witness, the infamous (non-existent?) Viane Delgado, who told the tabloid that the dog owner, one Chrissie Brodigan, had shouted anti-Semitic slurs at the officer. (Brodigan says she lost her job because of the unsubstantiated smear.) And exactly one year later, the Post is reporting on another young woman who got arrested for the same crime. It's tradition!
Icelyn Garcia, 25, a Brooklyn College accounting student, is suing the city in Federal court because she got arrested and spent a night in the tombs after getting busted for carrying her dog in the subway. With few exceptions, pets must be transported in the subway with a carrier, but Garcia was shocked when an officer detained her as she carried her poodle Louie into the 86th Street station on the R line.
Garcia claims she pleaded with the cop not to give her a ticket, and gave the dog to her cousin, who took it out of the station. But Officer Jessica Gavaras refused to let her off, and when Garcia took out her cellphone to check the time, Officer Gavaras allegedly snatched the phone away. Garcia stupidly tried to grab her phone back, and the two struggled in a tug-of-war over the phone that ended, where else, with Garcia in handcuffs. (One witness, Diane Velgado, says Garcia deserved to get arrested because she was shouting mysoginistic slurs at the female cop.)
Garcia was charged with disorderly conduct, and spent the night in Central Booking, AKA The Tombs. "A prostitute offered me a job," Garcia tells the Post. "There were women in there hiding drugs in their private parts. People were fighting. I've never been around that caliber of people in my life. I was embarrassed. I was humiliated. It wasn't right." You know, we were almost on her side until she started whining like a little princess.
