Gothamist
A non-profit newsroom, powered by WNYC.
Gothamist
Listen Live
News
NYPD To People Exercising In City Parks: Your Asses Are Ours After Dark
By
Ben Yakas
Published Mar 1, 2014
Modified Mar 1, 2014
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
Never miss a story
Email address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .
By
Ben Yakas
Published Mar 1, 2014
Modified Mar 1, 2014
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
We rely on your support to make local news available to all
Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2026. Donate today
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
This week, Peter Shankman learned some hard truths about exercising in city parks when he was given a summons for running in Central Park too early in the morning. As we've since learned, Shankman was hardly the first New Yorker to be punished for his devotion to maintaining his own physical health—hell, he wasn't the only NYer punished this week. Crown Heights resident Bill Bradley, 28, was arrested in Prospect Park this past Tuesday after he was caught running in the park at 6:15 p.m., just after sunset.
Bradley, who wrote up his story for Next City, told us he runs in the park 6 or 7 days a week (almost always at night), and hasn't had a problem with police before this. He was given a misdemeanor for "disobeying a park sign," then arrested after cops discovered he had a warrant for an unpaid summons for drinking on his own stoop. Except, of course, he had paid it: "The city, it appeared, had either not received or failed to cash my check. Municipal efficiency at its finest."
While Bradley's arrest was at least partially due to incompetence, he was surrounded by other men while spending the night at the 72nd Precinct in Sunset Park who were all there for various similar (and similarly minor) misdemeanor charges ("Unpaid speeding tickets, hopping a turnstile, outstanding summons"). His court-appointed lawyer explained:
“I see these cases all the time,” Danny Ashworth, a staff attorney at the Legal Aid Society and my court-appointed representation, told me over the phone yesterday. “It’s the ‘broken windows’ theory of law enforcement in action. The concept is, you catch 10,000 little fish in your net, you get a couple of big fish, too. Too bad for the little fish.”
Bradley was one of the first called before the judge on Wednesday; his ticket was dismissed immediately. If it seems somewhat coincidental that two people were ticketed for the same minor, usually overlooked offense this week, it probably isn't: "Most people who've gotten in touch think it's a bogus charge, and have mentioned end of the month quotas as a reason I didn't just get a warning," Shankman had theorized.
Like Shankman, 44-year-old UES resident Kyle Thomas was training for an Ironman competition in November 2012 when he was busted for the same offense in Central Park: "It was an egregious waste of the court's time and even the judge thought so," Thomas told us.
Thomas was running south on the West Side loop of the park near 72nd Street when he was stopped by cops around 4:45 a.m. that day, and given the misdemeanor. Thomas, who estimates he still bikes and runs four times a week at that hour, says he usually doesn't have any problem with the cops who monitor the park. He appeared in court to fight the ticket: "The judge was asleep, he was 100 years old. It was like a scene from Night Court," he told us. "I stood up said things like, ‘This is an egregious and surreptitious waste of the court's time and tax payers money, etc.’ I based my defense on the scene from Ghostbusters II, when they were in court. Lol but serious."
After his speech, he was asked to approach the judge: "He asked me if I knew that the park was officially closed [at that hour]. I told them, 'I didn’t know a park can close?' The judge said, “now you know” and it was dismissed."
Other people who exercise in the park regularly reached out to us after becoming incredulous upon reading Shankman's story: "I am in the park before 6 a.m. at least three times a week all year," UWS resident Jim Matison, 69, said. "I was there [Friday] morning in the cold at 5:45 for an hour...I am far from alone; hundreds of others are doing the same thing including numerous dog walkers. And the police see us all and never say a word." He told us:
I have never been hassled by the police, but every year they get into the “ticket-the-bikers” madness. Running over pedestrians in crosswalks is bad (tickets are appropriate), but on some sections of the roads in the park bikers (good ones) are able to exceed the speed limit of 25 mph. Tickets have been issued to 27 mph speeders.
As we've previously reported, the NYPD does seem to start aggressively enforcing traffic laws in Central Park once a year or so with no warning—at least for bikers and runners, if not drivers.
Matison added that he noticed multiple large signs scattered about the park with rules listed along with a map: "The good news is that the rules indicate that the park closes at 1:00 a.m. There was no mention of the time it opened."
Thomas had one idea as to how the city could stop wasting city resources with these nonsense tickets: "The city could offer athletic passes kind of like the ones used to swim laps in Lasker Pool. That way both the city and residents are saved from this bureaucratic loop hole," he said.
Tagged
central park
cops
exercise
peter shankman
prospect park
running
ticket
original
Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
Read more
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
MORE news
NY Gov. Hochul once resisted a data center pause. Now it’s central to her campaign.
The governor’s Republican opponent, Bruce Blakeman, says Hochul failed to prepare for the disruptive industry.
By
Jon Campbell
Published Oct 27, 2026 at 6:00 a.m. ET
Judge temporarily halts overnight construction at NYC’s Chinatown jail
The order comes after Chinatown residents sued the city over noise, health concerns and years of planned after-hours construction.
By
Giulia Heyward
News
Judge temporarily halts overnight construction at NYC’s Chinatown jail
The order comes after Chinatown residents sued the city over noise, health concerns and years of planned after-hours construction.
By
Giulia Heyward
Pressure grows on Mamdani to reform admissions to NYC specialized high schools
By
Elizabeth Kim
Police search for man in Central Park sexual assault
By
Charles Lane
Rockefeller Center's 2026 Christmas tree is a 76-foot spruce from Upstate New York
By
Giulia Heyward
Never miss a story
Catch up on the most important headlines with a roundup of essential NYC stories, delivered to your inbox daily.
Sign upEmail address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .