NYPD busts CKUT

ENOR

A Montreal reporter arrested during an illegal street protest against the World Economic Forum (WEF) in New York two weeks ago says police held him for nearly three days in repugnant conditions. Stefan Christoff, host of a Tuesday morning radio show on CKUT, was one of nearly 90 arrested during an illegal street protest on February 3. “I had run off to the sidewalk and was recording the march. A cop charged me and slammed me into a wall,” says Christoff, 20. “And after I showed him my press pass he said I was still under arrest.” Christoff says police kept activists in a cockroach-infested jail without beds, kept lights on at all times, and deprived some protesters of medical care. “Police broke a guy’s finger when he was resisting arrest, and they didn’t take him to the hospital until the whole jail started chanting.”

Activists arrested February 3 were protesting police tactics at a legal demo the day before, when between 10 and 15,000 people protested the meeting of nearly 3,000 of the world’s biggest business leaders and policy makers. Activists are considering a legal suit against New York police for alleged illegal arrests and detentions and depriving activists of lawyers. An activist who answered the phone at the People’s Law Collective would not comment on the case. But a press release on the IndyMedia Web site asks people to “Fight the NYPD by helping the People’s Law Collective (PLC) and help the prisoners who had to suffer physical abuse.” :

—Craig Segal