To Assault and Perjure

Although I might poke some fun at folks who ride fixies, I'm glad for anyone to ride a bike rather than drive, especially in big cities like NY and SF where it takes some courage to ride in a hostile environment. And in NYC the police are essentially at war with cyclists. Don't believe me? Read on.

First, before you watch the video below, I want you to read how the police officer described this encounter under oath. He said that the cyclist was "weaving in and out of the center lane of traffic, thereby forcing multiple vehicles to stop." He then instructed the cyclist to stop, but the cyclist "drove [his] bicycle directly into [the officer's] body causing [the officer] to fall to the ground and to suffer lacerations."

Ok, that's the police officer's sworn story. Here's what happened:

As the New York times put it, "the availability of cheap digital technology — video cameras, digital cameras, cellphone cameras — has ended a monopoly on the history of public gatherings that was limited to the official narratives, like the sworn documents created by police officers and prosecutors."

Translated from New York Timesese into English, that means some cops have been getting caught perjuring themselves.

While incidents like these do sometimes get caught on tape, imagine how this usually would have gone down. This poor cyclist, the victim of a brutal and completely unprovoked police assault, would be facing serious charges of assaulting a police officer. Any trial would likely be his word against the police. He'd probably plead out and end up with a criminal record.