Today was a beautiful day in New York City.
The sky was bright, blue sky, it was a warm, sunny 75 degrees.

I decide to go for a walk in Harlem down 125^th St.
I’m walking from Malcolm X Blvd aka Lenox Ave heading east
past the shops, store keepers and street merchants
I see a woman wearing a “We are all Sean Bell T-shirt”.

As I stroll past 5th Ave in front of 55 E 125th St
(where ex-President Bill Clinton has an office)
I see a man with a giant placard reading…

“Diallo - 41 SHOTS
 SEAN BELL - 50 SHOTS
 WHO’S NEXT - 100 SHOTS”

I look up in the sky and I see an NYPD helicopter
flying around in circles overhead.

I walk past Madison Ave, Park Ave and I see a woman
carrying a sign that reads… “Jail Racist Cops”.

As I get to 125th St and Lexington Ave I see a hugh
crowd of people standing in the middle of the street.

Traffic is stalled by gridlock in all 4 directions and the cars
trying to get the next 3 blocks down 125th to get to the
Triborough Bridge start honking their horns in frustration.

The crowd is gathered in a circle in the middle of the street.
I hear the crowd yelling… 49, 50, 51, 52, 53…
In the middle of the crowd is a woman jumping rope.

The crowd is playing jump rope in the middle of the intersection
of 125th and Lexington. Orderly civil disobedience obstructing
traffic and protesting the Sean Bell verdict.

Marching up 125th St from 3rd Ave, I see a couple dozen
New York Police Department Officers marching down the street
in formation. (It reminded me of Storm Troopers).

Attached to their belts was something that looked like ropes.
It turns out to be plastic ties which they use like handcuffs.
They are each carrying about a dozen of them.

Just then a school bus (only it was painted blue with the letters
NYPD on the side) makes it way up the street.
Inside the bus you could see a few detainees sticking their heads
out the open windows.

I could tell they were detainees because they didn’t have use of
their hands or arms, which were handcuffed behind them with
those plastic ties.

Meanwhile, in the middle of the intersection, the woman finally
missed the jump rope and was replaced by another jumper.

The police pulled out their bullhorns and told the crowd
that if they didn’t move from the middle of the intersection
they would be arrested.

All along 125th St (which is also called Dr Martin Luther King Jr
Blvd) from 3rd Ave to Lexington were parked police vans,
just waiting to take some arrestees to jail.

Interestingly enough, many of the police officers had cameras
and were taking pictures of the rope jumpers and the crowd.

SHOWTIME….
Either Bail or Go to Jail.

Perhaps they looked at the faces of the people in the Police Bus
sticking their head out the windows, who were on their way to jail,
or perhaps it was something else, but the crowd decided to move
out of the intersection and let the cars pass.

The police helicopter overhead flew out of sight, traffic returned 
to normal and people went on with their busy lives.
Another interesting day in Harlem, New York City. 

Don’t tolerate financial injustice.
www.MoneyPlus2000.com

 

 

 

TAGS: 125th St, Bill Clinton, Diallo, Dr Martin Luther King, Harlem, Malcolm X, New York City, NYPD, Police, Sean Bell, Triborough Bridge

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 8th, 2008 at 1:47 am and is filed under Misc.. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.