Related article:
Man says NYPD assaulted him, cops deny claim
By Anthony M. Destefano and Rocco Parascandola
Newsday
NEW YORK — The Brooklyn police officer who witnessed the subway platform confrontation between a 24-year-old man and four other cops accused of sodomizing him with a police radio is considering cooperating with authorities, according to sources briefed on the investigation.
It was not clear what the officer could lend to the grand jury investigation, but sources briefed on the matter say the officer’s potential testimony at the very least may bolster Michael Mineo’s claim that he was beaten up.
Mineo was confronted outside the station for smoking marijuana, then ran off and resisted arrest when police caught him inside the station.
A tattoo parlor employee from Brooklyn, Mineo said he was beaten, then pinned to the ground, with one cop pressing his knee against Mineo’s neck and another, identified by police sources as Officer Alex Cruz, violating him with a police radio.
A grand jury panel began meeting Tuesday and is expected to spend up to a month investigating the allegation and determining if the officers should be indicted.
Early forensic tests on the radio and Cruz’s baton were negative, but DNA tests are pending.
Mineo, his lawyers said yesterday, at first described to Internal Affairs and the Brooklyn district attorney’s office an attack carried out by five officers.
But the grand jury is focusing on the four officers, all from the 71st Precinct, who were part of the chase.
The fifth officer, who works for the Transit Bureau, is considered a witness because he got to the platform as the other officers were subduing Mineo, sources say. However, he is weighing a deal with prosecutors out of concern the evidence may point toward his own culpability.
Of the eight or so civilian witnesses, however, none say they saw Mineo sodomized. Two of those witnesses were cited by police last Thursday, when word of the Oct. 15 incident leaked out, as evidence that the officers did nothing wrong.
Copyright 2008 Newsday