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Haw Haw The NYPD Killed These Dirt Bikes Real Good On Facebook Live
By
Scott Heins
Published May 17, 2016
Modified May 17, 2016
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By
Scott Heins
Published May 17, 2016
Modified May 17, 2016
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This afternoon, the NYPD fulfilled its promise to punish the city's "knuckleheads" by crushing a massive pile of confiscated dirt bikes and ATVs with a bulldozer—and because they were essentially meting out justice at a monster truck rally, they streamed it on Facebook live.
The crushening happened at Erie Basin Auto Pound in Red Hook, and begins at about the 2:25 mark. But don't skip ahead: you must first reckon with how much fun NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton is having.
First, Bratton walks along the line of condemned bikes and ATVs, gazing into their guilty faces, a final requiem for the damned.
Then, at the 58 second mark, the commissioner takes his perch atop a two foot metal podium, literally seizing the moral high ground. He rests his fists atop the podium's protective barricades before waving a checkered race flag.
"Just like the Indy 500," Bratton says, a bit nervously, because he is the civilian leader of a massive armed force, standing on a podium, conducting wanton destruction for our entertainment.
Forget the Buzzfeed surgery-streamers and the do-gooders at the New York Times. No Kawasaki is safe, and the long arm of the law is both swift and viral. Smash that "Like" button!
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Scott Heins
Scott Heins is a freelance photo and video journalist based in New York City, and a frequent contributor to Gothamist + WNYC. His work often centers around labor rights, housing, and policing. In 2018-2019 he traveled to four states while covering a wave of public school teachers strikes, with work featured in The New York Times, The Intercept, Getty Images, Splinter, and Bloomberg Photos. Scott is a dues-paying member of the National Writers Union's Freelance Solidarity Project.
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