Two New York City police cars appeared to ram into protesters gathered over the death of George Floyd, according to at least two videos posted on Twitter on Saturday night.
A 25-second video, shot from above looking down at the street, shows dozens of protesters gathering on the street, some of them behind an orange fence separating the crowd from a vehicle. of the NYPD.
Protesters threw several items at the vehicle, including an orange traffic cone.
A second NYPD vehicle sped to the right of the first, honking its horn, pushing some protesters back as it sped forward.
Then, the first NYPD vehicle rammed into the orange fence, forcing people on the other side of the fence to flee. The video shows at least one person falling. It is not clear if anyone was injured.
The clip was viewed more than 1.5 million times in the hours after it was posted. Global News has emailed the NYPD for more information and will update this story if it receives a response.
A subsequent video by the Twitter user shows an NYPD vehicle parked in the middle of what appears to be the same street. One person climbed onto the hood, while the others appeared to rush into the vehicle.
A second video shot from across the street appears to show another vantage point of the same incident, showing the NYPD vehicle suddenly plowing into a crowd of protesters.
Protesters angry about Floyd’s death in Minneapolis took to the streets of New York for the third day in a row. Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man, was killed in an arrest Monday.
Footage shows a white police officer kneeling on Floyd’s neck. Derek Chauvin was charged with third-degree murder and manslaughter on Friday.
Floyd’s death sparked four days of protests in Minnesota and cities across the United States.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio pleaded for calm during his press conference Saturday afternoon, as a protest in Brooklyn on Friday night left many people bleeding and vehicles set on fire.
According to the Associated Press, protests with thousands of protesters in Union Square and outside Brooklyn’s Prospect Park have mostly been peaceful. Later in the day, protesters in Brooklyn confronted police, who jostled some of the protesters and used an offensive chemical spray.
De Blasio expressed solidarity with protesters upset by police brutality, but promised an independent review of Friday night’s confrontation in which both protesters and police were involved. into violence.
The mayor said he was upset by videos of clashes in which “protesters were handled very roughly by police” and by reports that a state senator and member of state congress were among those who were sprayed with stimulants by the police.
On Saturday morning, New York police’s watchdog – the Civil Complaints Review Board, or CCRB – posted instructions on how to file a complaint and said it had received a complaint stemming from the call. protest on Friday night.
“As a reminder: If you see footage of an incident here or elsewhere on social media, you can file a complaint as a witness,” the CCRB tweeted.
One Twitter user informed the CCRB of the NYPD vehicle video, saying, “This one is for you.”
The CCRB responded, saying it could start an investigation based on complaints received from people who saw the incident on social media.
The NYPD is facing scrutiny over an incident during Friday night protests that were also captured on video.
Multiple videos posted on Friday night showed an officer shoving a woman hard enough that she fell and hit her head on the sidewalk.
The woman, Dounya Zayer of New York, recounted her ordeal in a series of videos posted Saturday morning, saying she was rushed to the emergency room after having a seizure.
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