NYPD TRY TO PULL BABY AWAY FROM MOTHER AT BROOKLYN SNAP CENTER
NYPD Tries To Take Baby Away
NEW YORK (FOX 5 NY) - Video showing police officers in Brooklyn trying to pull a baby from the clutches of its mother as she was wrestled to the floor inside a food assistance center has prompted outrage as well as lots of questions.
A woman who was inside the SNAP center in Boreum Hill on Dec. 7 shared the video, which has gone viral. She told The New York Times that the child was "screaming for his life."
"The lady was begging for them to get off of her," Nyashia Ferguson, who posted the video on Facebook under the name Monae Sinclair, told the Times. "I was scared."
Ferguson said the mother had sat down on the floor of the social services center because of a lack of chairs. A security guard confronted her but she didn't want to move.
The office staff and Human Resources Administration peace officers made unsuccessful attempts to remove the woman "due to her disorderly conduct towards others, and for obstructing the hallway," the NYPD said. The staff then called the police.
The video shows officers dragging the woman across the floor as other officers separate the baby from her. Lying on the floor, she mouths, "I'm begging you, please."
Police arrested the mother, Jazmine Headley, 23, and charged her with resisting arrest, acting in a manner injurious to a child, obstructing governmental administration and criminal trespass. Authorities turned over the toddler to a family member.
"This is unacceptable, appalling and heart breaking," City Council Speaker Corey Johnson, a Democrat, said on Twitter. "I'd like to understand what transpired and how these officers or the NYPD justifies this. It's hard to watch this video."
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