As a new mayoral task force conducts sweeps of hundreds of shops suspected of selling illegal weed, a video of a raid on a Staten Island store obtained by THE CITY captures how enlisting police to conduct regulatory inspections can lead to criminal charges, igniting concerns about potential due process violations.
The 90-second clip taken from a store surveillance camera on May 18 shows seven uniformed law enforcement officers, most of them in NYPD gear, cursing, jumping over the store counter and charging at a shopkeeper after he asked them for a court order before opening the door to the back of the store.
Instead, the man was cuffed – before any unlicensed cannabis products were found – and taken to a local precinct where he was charged with obstruction of justice, records show.
“When a cop tells you to do something, you fucking do it,” one officer told the shopkeeper.
The surveillance video was shared with THE CITY on the condition that the identity of the shopkeeper be protected. The arrest and criminal charge was confirmed by police records.
The shopkeeper’s lawyer, Steve Zissou, told THE CITY that the video shows both due process violations and personal civil rights violations.
“Asking for a court order is not an obstruction of justice,” Zissou said, adding that the shopkeeper was asserting his constitutional rights. “This is restarting the war on drugs under the guise of a civil process.”