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Cops Ticket Cronut-Carrying Jaywalker In Brooklyn, Blame De Blasio
By
Ben Yakas
Published Mar 20, 2014
Modified Mar 20, 2014
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By
Ben Yakas
Published Mar 20, 2014
Modified Mar 20, 2014
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As you probably know by now, the NYPD has given out nearly 900% more jaywalking tickets in 2014 than they did in 2013. The jaywalking crackdown has led to cops giving out fake and real summonses to pedestrians all around Brooklyn regardless of whether they are breaking any rules. Nic Garcia, 27, was just about to chow down on some cronuts earlier today when he got just such a ticket while walking in Bed-Stuy. "Three cops in an NYPD van pulled me over as I was walking down the sidewalk after having crossed the street," Garcia told us.
"I was obviously pretty unenthused about the situation (I happened to have two cronuts in my bag ready for destruction), and as they were writing my ticket, they looked at me and said, 'De Blasio is making us enforce it, it's been all over the news,'" he added.
Garcia, a photographer who lives in the neighborhood, had just gotten off the train and was crossing Fulton Street at Throop when the cops appeared. As they were writing him up, Garcia says police noticed a woman crossing the street at a nearby corner with no cars coming in any direction. "One cop said, 'HER! pull her over!' and they [put the siren on], but she didn't turn around because why would she?" Garcia recalled. "So they got on the loud speaker and said, 'MISS IN THE BLACK JACKET.' They called her over and she got written up too. It took them a while, they made multiple phone calls."
After he got his ticket, a different officer told Garcia that "he 'knows it's just what people do but de Blasio is enforcing it' and that I won't have to pay anything, but I have to show up [at court]. He told me to just say I didn't know I couldn't cross there, and they'd throw it out since it's a new rule that hasn't been enforced." We've heard similar stories of other people whose jaywalking tickets have been thrown out, though we hadn't heard that cops were coaching people on how to work around a bullshit quality-of-life bandaid.
De Blasio seems to have lost at least one supporter after this experience: "I've been a supporter of de Blasio but this is a serious deal breaker," Garcia said. "The whole thing was pretty amusing too—I've been jaywalking next to, in front of, and along with cops for years."
Tagged
bedstuy
blame
brooklyn
de Blasio
jaywalking
nic garcia
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Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
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