NYPD BIKE THEFT
Cops Snatch Dozen Bikes in "Operation Bike Raid"
By Gabby Sloan

[June, 2007] On the evening of May 30, 2007, Ninth Precinct cops, led by Ninth Precinct Lieutenant Robert Corcoran, executed "Operation: Bike Raid" on East Sixth Street, between First and Second Avenues. 

As cops with special metal cutting saws chewed through locks and chains on bikes locked to parking meters and streets signs, Sixth Street resident Robert Carnevale confronted them, having received a call from his girlfriend outside his apartment building. Carnevale quickly rang buzzers in buildings on his block to warn his neighbors that their bikes were being taken and then returned to the scene of the crime, taking

The camera shy Lt. Corcoran

photos of cops loading the dozen or so bikes they had just stolen into two unmarked dark blue vans with paneling over the side windows. (These vans can be seen regularly parked outside the Ninth Precinct on East Fifth Street.)

After taking still photos, Carnevale switched his digital camera to video mode, filming the cops in action. At one point, he approached the plain-clothed Lt. Corcoran, who was obviously in charge of the operation. Annoyed that Carnevale asked him for his name, Corcoran mumbled it. When asked to repeat his name by spelling it, Corcoran told him: "You got my name, I did you a favor. . . . now I'm going to lock you up." In addition to arresting Carnevale, Corcoran busted a woman passing by who dared to ask what was going on. He charged both with "Disorderly Conduct" and put them through the system. 

At a press conference five days later addressing the bike thefts and arrests by the cops on Sixth Street, civil rights attorney (and New York City's true Public Advocate) Norman Siegel said that the "Bike Raid" might have resulted from a complaint by "Community" Board Three. Siegel noted that in September 2005, a judge had ruled that the city violated the rights of three cyclists when cops clipped their locks and took their bikes without warning. "The unlawful activity here is not by the cyclists, it's by the cops," Siegel said.


Lt. Corcoran arrests Carnevale for asking his name without a permit

[All photos here are by Robert Carnevale and Caroline Dorn. You can see Robert Carnevale's video of Operation Bike Theft and his filmed arrest online at: <http://blip.tv/file/252942/>]