Philadelphia police officer Richard Nicoletti, 35, has been charged with three counts of simple assault after a video showed him spraying peaceful, kneeling protesters with pepper spray during recent protests. The case could present some challenging elements for prosecutors, but I was particularly appalled to see Nicoletti pull down the goggles of one protester to spray her in the face. Such a close saturation of pepper spray is in my view excessive and unwarranted, particularly when none of these protesters were threatening officers.
Here is the video:
The challenging element for the prosecution will be the fact that the order was given for the deployment of pepper spray, which is allowed to clear areas following the issuance of proper warnings. I do not see why the use of the pepper spray was needed rather than arresting the nonviolent individuals. What was particularly concerning was that one of the suspects appears blinded and was walking near opposing traffic.
Most police departments, like the department in Baltimore, do not approve the use of pepper spray on those “who are compliant or who are exhibiting only passive resistance.” These three protesters are clearly not compliant but only showing passive resistance.
That however leads back to the decision to give the order for pepper spray. Nicoletti’s supervisors are not charged in ordering what Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner is now charging as a criminal assault.
That will present a defense for trial. However, an order to use pepper spray does not give license to use it indiscriminately or excessively, particularly on those showing passive resistance. That brings me back to the young woman who had her googles pulled down. Nicoletti was spraying oleoresin capsicum directly into her eyes and nose from a few inches away. That was as unnecessary as it was dangerous.
Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney and Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw have publicly apologized for the deployment of tear gas during the protest and declared to end the use of pepper spray to disperse crowds in these circumstances. However, that will not prevent Nicoletti from raising the order as a defense point. While Krasner hyperbolically called this the “Nuremberg” defense, it is a valid issue for the jury to consider. Police officers rely on superiors to green light the use of nonlethal force. They are often unaware of what is unfolding on a scene beyond their vision (particularly when wearing protective gears). While the rules have now changed on the use of the such spray, he was following the orders and guidelines at the time in the authority to use the spray.
Where I agree with the prosecutors in the inappropriate way that the spray was used. Just as officers can use their batons to push back a crowd, they can still use such force excessively. Indeed, I recently testified in Congress on the controversy surrounding the clearing of the area around Lafayette Park. While I concluded that the order to clear the area was lawful and that the Park Police complied with the guidelines on warnings, I still believed that the charging of the line appeared excessive and certainly the attack on an Australian news team was unlawful.
According to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Nicoletti was suspended from the department for 30 days with intent to dismiss.
I was always taught that it was illegal to intentionally block traffic
in sane times, police would arrest those who do so
however, police are often now restrained by orders from sinister Democrat megacity mayors who want to ruin our country out of spite for Orange man
https://www.unz.com/mmalkin/one-nation-under-anarcho-tyranny/
it is then the Democrat mayors who should now be arrested for insurrection and conspiracy
Kinda funny that Baltimore PD is used as an example for the use of pepper spray. That tactic there has gone over like a fart in a divers helmet.
We are supposed to be a nation of laws, and that no one is above the law. We hire and train police who are supposed to be professionals, it is their duty to uphold the law and protect the people. But many of them don’t, they engage in brutality and civil rights violations, and it has been clearly shows that the police view themselves to be above the law. So the people protest, demand justice and accountability form the police. And what do they get? More brutality. Protests are supposed to be disruptive and annoying, that is the way that you get your message across and protesting is a hallmark of our democracy. But what do the commentators on this (and many others) want? You guys are literal calling for the murder of these protesters. Do you even have the foggiest idea about what that would lead to? I will give you a hint, we fought major wars against people who did that. You should all be ashamed of yourselves, for you are calling for the end to the US being a free country.
You clearly demonstrate why the protests are needed.
Yes, the police need to follow the laws, but how about applying that approach to those in protests who aren’t in the ‘mostly peaceful’ contingent?
With all of the abject violence directed at the police by the mob, it’s nothing short of a miracle that there hasn’t been far worse carnage visited upon these idiots.
LorenzoValla says, “With all of the abject violence directed at the police by the mob, it’s nothing short of a miracle that there hasn’t been far worse carnage visited upon these idiots.”
It’s not a miracle. It’s the total absence of police brutality that the leftists are using as an excuse to run rampant. The marxist minions are so desperate to maintain their false narrative that they’ve had to elevate things like: getting pepper sprayed, or slapped with a baton, or pushed, or knocked down, or arrested without the police officers first introducing themselves and saying please and thank you – to borderline genocide.
Im not calling for murdering anybody
I am calling for the lawful use of force to terminate the commission of forcible felonies. arson is univesally considered a forcible felony.
in a riot situation, good sense recommends that arsonists must be shot to prevent further spread of fire
also aggrravated battery is usually a felony and same thing applies. lethal force can be used to prevent harm to others if there is a fear of grave bodily harm or death of oneself or of innocent people around you
under riot circumstances where rioters are throwing bricks or frozen water bottles or stabbing police with sharpened pvc pipes as in chicago, these felonies should be terminated by shooting the aggressors with live ammunition
this is NOT saying shoot peaceful protesters but Molly can’t figure it out
I also do NOT favor spraying pepper spray into the eyes of people who are cuffed and compliant with their arrests, that was a criminal act and was properly charged.
this does not change my opinion that an organized conspiracy to block public rights of way should not be cleared with whatever amount of force is necessary
it’s funny that these protesters are acting like THEY are the new police. how dare them!
oh wait! the girls in the middle of the street were not cuffed. i thought they just staged them there. OK, they were told to move and they didnt
the cop applied non lethal pepper spray to try and move them. this was legit. I take it back, he was not properly charged
i was mistaken in thinking they had already been arrested. i guess i need to read more closely
clear the roadways of the law abiding taxpayers from the insurrectionists!
lucky cops arent using the thing we used to call a ‘street sweeper,” i bet they still have some buried in their closets
Pepper spray is not brutality. You really need to watch some foreign news sometime. I haven’t seen the posts calling for the murder of these marxists, but if people are actually saying that, there’s something wrong with them.
The actual reality is, police brutality in our country is not an actual problem. You are much more likely to be murdered by a civilian or killed in a car accident than assaulted by a cop. Look at some unbiased statistics some time. Sam Harris just released a good discussion on this.
First it was for “George Floyd,” then it was for, “BLM,” then it was for “Systematic Racism,” then it was “Police brutality,” next it will be for Big Bird. Americans aren’t that stupid. These minimarxists think this is their moment, well it’s not. They should have listened to their Pelosis and professors and bided their time, quietly indoctrinating at least one more generation of American youths, but these kids lack experience and patience. It was a false start.
We’re not watching protesters get brutalized. We’re watching wannabe enemy insurgents get slaps on the wrist.
its coming
guy punches out ANTIFA blocking roadways
antifa crumples, pasty faced geeks
https://twitter.com/KatieDaviscourt/status/1286485334226690049?s=20
The officer was waaaay too gentle. He should have head kicked the trash a few times. Any POS that shuts down traffic for their racist, anti american crap, should be run over by about a hundred cars and trucks.
Get the hell outta the street!!!!!!!
That’s not protesting!!!! Protestors stay on the sidewalks, not the streets and hiways.
I say carry real guns that shoot real bullets, and start killing this trash. This is an illegal bunch of crap. These scum bags want to destroy the nation. This is just as much a war as if we were invaded by a foreign army. Shoot a few hundred of the scumbags and there won’t be any more ILLEGAL rioting.
Kill them all, they’re the enemy. Don’t try to appease them, it never works.
Wow. You are advocating full on mass murder in response to what is at most an inconvenient protest.
Molly, this site is overloaded with tough talking right wingers who supposedly favor small government and individual freedom, until it’s a political opponent getting beaten up. Trump is the resentment president and that’s the key to his base – frustrated and angry males who didn’t get the date, make the team, get the promotion, or get out of town.
I know and I don’t understand it, for JT himself and his posts are pretty reasonable and well thought out. I commonly don’t agree with JT, but he is no way an extremist.
i reject the false allure of “individualism” and i have long recognized, about 2 decades, of my previous intellectual errors in espousing liberterianism
I believe in strong government to protect lthe rights of law abiding people, and strong government to crush racketeers and criminals
that is all this riot schtick has become — a nationwide protection racket. it is lead by sinister global nation-wreckers who finance it like Geo Soros,
it has professional racketeers aka protest organizers in the middle,
and it has enlisted street thugs, anarchists, and spoiled brats and skinny white pasty faced geeks and heroin addicts at the bottom
round them all up but it would be best to start at the top. start with the billionaires who are funding
of course that is always just a vain hope in America where finance is the true aristocracy
we saw that in the wake of the mortgage finance debacle of 2007, that Obama’s man Eric Holder rounded up about 300 low level mortgage brokers and sent them to prison, but not one billionaire or captain of finance paid a price.
and no bernie madoff was not an example either, he was not part of the systemic mortgage fraud, he was running a side racket which was not more than a big ponzi scheme
unfortunately i see no signs from the DOJ today either that they will lay hands on creeps like Soros.
until they arrest somebody like Clapper, it’s all just vain posturing, and Soros is really in charge. that’s the reality underlying this whole mess and also the fake and malingering Republican party that has dragged its feet and done poorly at nearly everything for Trump’s entire term, undercutting him significantly with a lack of energy
and so now Trump is doing very little, perhaps, because he realizes there is very little he is allowed to do by those who as we can see, as I said, are the true aristocracy, the masters of finance
There are idiots on all sides.
The ones on the right are online.
The ones on the left are running loose in mobs.
A peaceful protest does not include blocking highways. That is an act of violence and you get what you deserve.
Pretty much. The ‘protesters’ are obnoxious children preventing people from going about their daily business. People practiced at self-help know how to address these problems when the police aren’t around.
The lawful use of public rights of way by the citizens is a right!
the PROTESTERS are nothing more than HIGHWAYMEN AND EXTORTIONISTS
they should all be arrested for this. and then take down the ringleaders!
and those who finance them
ignorant people may not understand what a “highwayman” is. i will let adam ant explain
Blocking roads is not a violent act under any reasonable definition. Nether is sitting at a lunch counter, nor riding a bus, nor kneeling at a football game. Let me also point out that no one called the Bridgegate scandal an act of violence.
Blocking roads is not a violent act under any reasonable definition.
Someone’s being prevented from using the road. They’re interposing their carcasses.
Nether is sitting at a lunch counter, nor riding a bus, nor kneeling at a football game.
Tawdry attempt at stealing a base.
Pepper spray is non lethal. Enough nonsense, now. These “protesters” will recover just fine. They should go get jobs like the rest of America instead of rousing rabble over leftist propaganda.
I don’t know what procedures should be used when removing recalcitrant persons performing an illegal act. The area needed to be cleared for public safety reasons. Professor Turley said, ” I do not see why the use of the pepper spray was needed rather than arresting the nonviolent individuals.” Aside from the fact we don’t know that the policeman didn’t put them under arrest, how does telling them they are under arrest remove those people from the highway? Placing then under arrest and bringing them to jail In this case seemed to require force.
Professor Turley, I don’t like the optics in this situation either, but I would like you as a criminal attorney to tell us the better ways of removing such recalcitrant persons without causing harm to the person or the police?
Allan:
Not a difficult concept.
The demonstrators were passive. Four cops could handcuff them and haul them away, one at a time. The other cops provide overwatch and could respond quickly if resistance went from passive to active.
I suspect that your biases prevented you from thinking clearly about this situation.
“I suspect that your biases prevented you from thinking clearly”
Monument, things are not as easy as you seem to believe and no, my comment was not an act of bias. You were wrong. What I said was “Professor Turley, I don’t like the optics in this situation either, but I would like you as a criminal attorney to tell us the better ways of removing such recalcitrant persons without causing harm to the person or the police?” That is a legitimate question absent bias.
Arrest in the manner you suggest has caused harm to policemen and perpetrators. A fight could occur injuring one or both of the parties. We have seen that. On this blog and in the news media there are claims of police brutality. I think it is fair to define what police brutality is and to state the procedures that should be used with recalcitrant individuals. As I said, I don’t know. Maybe the use of pepper spray or some other spray is less dangerous. Maybe not, but Professor Turley is a criminal defense attorney so I think such input could be valuable.
In the meantime, yes, problems such as these, where protestors cause harm to others or do not have approval, should be appropriately managed. I don’t know that either of us knows what should be done. I suspect we need deep thought into the problem because criminals can physically overpower the police and especially with drugs can put themselves into very dangerous and life threatening situations.
I’m a copster.
I’m in Philly!
You are sitting…next to Willy!
You remember… Ernest Flemming?
He got toemine …after dinner.
Here we shoot em..with our tasers.
And we had them.. with our lasers.
Don’t be stupid…we get dangerous.
Go to DC where it’s fungus.
What is the remedy for the officer’s bad judgement to use more-than-necessary non-fatal force? Bad judgement, even by a police officer, is not a crime. Qualified immunity? Perhaps he may be liable in a civil action?
Peace Officers take note.. When you conduct yourselves in a reasonable and constitutional manner as this officer did.. (Clearing the public roadway) we support you and back you.. Conservatives will always look beyond the headlines and be inclined to back you as individuals doing a difficult job…. We will always oppose political prosecutions of officers as we do in this case..
Tell your family and friends to vote accordingly..
We support you and donate money for your legal defense as you are increasingly being prosecuted for “Political Crimes” You need to support us.. end of story
The cop’s action were not reasonable, he intentionally violated department guidelines. And pulling down face masks and goggles also is completely unreasonable.
The cop’s action were not reasonable,
Oh, yes they were. The ‘protester’ has no franchise to interfere with other’s business. And if you try this, any person seeking to use the thoroughfare can justly push you out of the way and take every necessary measure to see to it that they can proceed. You want to play stupid games, you deserve the prizes.
Says the guy who condones the actions of Roy Den Hollander.
I bet it scares the bejeezus out of some people that a lawyer like that guy, who had once been employed by Cravath Swaine & Moore, a silkstocking firm, could one day be a trigger-man. Well, the news says he had cancer, and apparently, he decided to out with a bang.
I have nothing to say about this case, except to observe, that for a lawyer to go from a plum job like that, to where he ended up, well, wow, I guess events have a way of transforming people
No telling who’s being transformed by the current events today, nor how!
They’re sitting in the middle of highway i76! The criminal protestors should be arrested, not the cop.
Its time to do whatever is necessary to stop these people and maintain order. The insanity continues to make those you ask to protect you the enemy.
The enema
Then Kane em!
Well now!
”Chicago anti-police protesters target mayor’s home after her call with Trump”
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/chicago-anti-police-protesters-target-mayors-home-after-her-call-with-trump
Yeah, she must be real close to Trump.
If you sit in the street you get off your feet and can’t run from a gun. You must leave it in peace or you will get cut in a piece.
Frankly, if a few more of these ‘protestors’ had to deal with more serious consequences, we might just see a little less of this stupidity going on. This officer might have over-reacted, but given how the police are being treated, threatened and outright hurt and injured while politicians refuse to back them up, I don’t blame the occasional one for losing his cool.
This falls within the grey area. The law meets itself here and must give way to determinations made to be specific, such as barring or allowing choke holds and shooting without provocation. The officer did not endanger the lives of the protesters regardless of whether or not they were breaking the law or following rules. The officer made an effective preemptive move to disable the protesters before dragging them off. In other situations officers have beaten protesters into submission. This doesn’t seem to reach the level of endangering lives. How effective is pepper spray on someone wearing goggles? Officers could have twist tied the protesters and dragged them off. Perhaps a new system should be developed, such as a net that could be drawn closed to envelop, lift up, and cart away the protester; all without harming it.
Im going to say what i said after rodney king., because it was same talk then.
if you ban chokeholds as such from police work, that will mean more suspects shot than before.
because the police will not bother using the lesser means of restraint, they will just go for the stronger one when the situation is hot
i don’t like what chauvin was doing, it was excessive in my view, however, this talk of banning chokeholds altogether is ridiculous
especially when people all around the country are practicing them in BJJ schools and MMA. they are basic techniques and safe when applied to most people
Floyd was not most people. he was obese, sick with covid, hopped up on meth, and no doubt this contributed to the proximate cause of his death,
I saw the Rodney King video. He was beaten relentlessly. The cops took turns. It was way beyond necessary. Choke holds if administered carefully and between guys that are in shape is one thing but most cops are not in shape and do them in times when they are out of control. Chauvin had no call to pull Floyd out of the car and kneel on his neck for 8+minutes. Regardless of Floyd’s condition, this was manslaughter and perhaps even murder. If a cop does something like that, it is all on him. The point being made by the protests is that the police need to be restrained, retrained, and restricted from using deadly force when not necessary. On top of that they need to be subject to the same accountability as the average citizen. When an officer goes to court, his history must come up. The bottom line is policing is necessary but it goes in the wrong direction sometimes and that must not be protected by BS arguments.
issac – there is every reason to believe that Floyd died from a cardiac incident brought on by CV-19, fentenyl and meth.
amazing rodney king took that taser and beating and kept on coming but he was hopped up too wasnt he.
but they couldnt choke him, see, even though that would have put him to sleep temporarily, because prohibited
yeah for guys like isaac, always the critics of the cops, now the cops dont want to make any arrests at all., pathetic state we are in today but it goes back to all this bleeding heart stuff
“it goes back to all” this bleeding heart stuff”
some of it, but one also has to look at police unions, collective bargaining and the cops’ failure to get rid of the bad apples infecting their ranks.
That net could leave rope burns. Now if it was made out of cotton, that might be acceptable.
Block the interstate stopping ambulances, firetrucks and police vehicles and you get what you get.
They were on THE HIGHWAY risking the lives of themselves and others! Already someone was killed by a car driven because of protests. HI s approach was wrong but the police should have physically removed them as soon as possible. PS the news reporting was absurd not to mention they were on a highway. A half truth is a full lie.
For you lawyers out there, what is the definition of ‘peaceful protest’, and when does it transition into a non-peaceful protest? I’m asking mostly within the context of the police issuing orders to disburse and then engaging those who don’t. I’m not referring to this case in the OP necessarily.
I think this is an important question because it seems that often the protestors do not obey the orders to disburse and then the media and activists claim they are ‘peaceful’.
While I think the officer went way beyond what was reasonable in the use of the pepper spray, I fail to see why any city is tolerating “peaceful protestors” on freeways. It’s very unsafe and interferes with free enterprise as well as ability of emergency personnel to respond to community problems in a timely manner. Any protestors on freeways should be immediately removed; if it takes pepper spray to do so, so be it, but obviously not in the manner done by this officer.
Since when are “peaceful protesters” kneeling the middle of an interstate? Jonathan are you aware they could be risking other people’s lives by the high-speed traffic-rerouting dangers they create? What about the risks they pose to civil society? Isn’t free speech with respect to “time, manner, and place”? How much longer do ordinary citizens have to see thugs who risk the lives of other citizens coddled?
JT says: “Such a close saturation of pepper spray is in my view excessive and unwarranted, particularly when none of these protesters were threatening officers. ”
Maybe so.
No protestors belong in the street. That’s not protesting. That’s urban warfare. Treat it as such!!!
You are exactly right. It’s amazing how many idiots tolerate this nonsense. If they’re in the street, run over the idiot scum. They care not about anybody, they just want to create chaos. So why should anyone care about them or their safety. Something the idiot public seems to forget is that respect is a two way street. These rioters have NO respect for ANYBODY. They are arrogant spoiled rotten trash.
You are calling for the murder of peaceful protesters and they have no respect?
They’re not ‘peaceful’ and they have no business being where they are. Time to put them in the pillory and smack ’em with a rattan cane.
Molly, It is sort of idiotic to call them “peaceful protesters”. They are blocking important roads used to save lives. You apprently don’t care about a baby sitting on a highway in an ambulance and dying because of your “peaceful protesters”. You apparently don’t care about the family that burns to death because the “peaceful protesters” prevented the fire trucks from getting to where they were needed. You apparently don’t think.
Blocking roads is not a violent act under any reasonable definition. Nether is sitting at a lunch counter, nor riding a bus, nor kneeling at a football game. Let me also point out that no one called the Bridgegate scandal an act of violence.
except for the fact that these protesters believe that speech can be violent and that free speech represents harm. you should read up on who they are and what they think.
Molly G:
“Blocking roads is not a violent act under any reasonable definition.”
*****************************
Here’s hoping your coronary event ambulance ride occurs on the protester’s side of the street with the hospital beyond. Not wanting anything too terrible to happen, I will concede you a vile of eppy but the anxiety on your face would be worth the price of admission.
Molly,
I could not stress more strongly that you reconsider your opinion & suggest you not protest/play in the middle of the highway in most every place in the US.
Or go ahead, I love reading the stories of the yearly Darwin Award winners. 😉
“Blocking roads is not a violent act under any reasonable definition.”
It’s illegal and on a major street can prevent ambulances, fire trucks etc. from getting to where they need to go and where time is of the essence. It can cause financial loss for a lot of people. You don’t care about others. You are selfish and only care about your own feelings and do not seem to have the ability to consider what is or is not dangerous.
Sitting at a lunch counter is not the same as blocking a major street. When people protest the protest is supposed be lawful. When one breaks the law one can be arrested or pay a fine.That is the way things have always been. Democrats only make exceptions when they are scared or it aids their political interests.
I’ve done a good deal of protesting in my life. I have never knowingly endangered another person’s life, property or ability to work. You seem to have no objection to instilling pain on innocent people. You don’t seem to know the difference between legal and illegal protest.