Officer David Afanador badge 31730 suspended after video of a Queens boardwalk arrest shows him choking suspect, Ricky Bellevue, rendered unconscious. History of prior abuse.
The police brutality continues. A NYPD police officer was on Sunday suspended after video emerged showing police using an apparent chokehold to make an arrest on a Queens boardwalk. The chokehold led to the suspect, a black man, being rendered unconscious.
Social media identified the suspended cop as Officer David I. Afanador, Badge # 31730 with the 100th precinct. The suspect was identified as Ricky Bellevue.
The incident unfolded at 8:45 a.m. near Beach 113th St and Ocean Promenade in Rockaway Beach in the NYPD’s 100th Precinct. David Afanador, was suspended without pay later that Sunday.
Anthony Beckford, a city council candidate, shared the video (see below) on Twitter claiming the officers were ‘performing an Illegal modern day lynching chokehold on a Black Man until he was unconscious. I demand his immediate firing & criminal charges for breaking the city & state ban. #DefundThePolice’.
‘Accountability in policing is essential. After a swift investigation by the Internal Affairs Bureau, a police officer involved in a disturbing apparent chokehold incident in Queens has been suspended without pay,’ NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea said in a statement, without naming the officer or specifying his role in the arrest. ‘While a full investigation is still underway, there is no question in my mind that this immediate action is necessary.’
Officer Afanador, Badge # 31730 of the @NYPD100Pct @NYPDnews at Far Rockaway Beach performing an Illegal modern day lynching chokehold on a Black Man until he was unconscious. I demand his immediate firing & criminal charges for breaking the city & state ban. #DefundThePolice pic.twitter.com/wtAmYWxIbE
— Anthony Beckford (City Council Candidate)🌹 (@Vote4Beckford) June 21, 2020
Shea continued, ‘We are committed to transparency as this process continues.’
In the video, a bystander could be heard screaming at the four officers: ‘Yo, he’s choking ‘em, let ‘em go!’ One of the officers was seen with his arm wrapped around the suspect’s neck.
Bellevue, was seen in longer body-cam video taunting police moments before grabbing an unidentified object and asking an officer, ‘You scared, you scared?’ Afterwards, one officer was seen tackling Bellevue to the ground.
The suspension follows the NYC Council passing legislation earlier this month that would make it a criminal offense for officers to use chokeholds, which were banned by the NYPD’s patrol guide nearly three decades ago, in all situations and by barring officers from sitting, kneeling or standing on a suspect’s chest and back during an arrest.
‘I want the officer who put him in a chokehold to be in the cell next to him,’ the suspect’s attorney, Lori Zeno of the Queens Defenders, told the nydailynews. ‘This guy should be charged criminally, and fired.’
She also said Bellevue was still recovering at the hospital. It’s unclear if he was facing any charges. A source said cops were responding to a call for an emotionally disturbed person.
David Afanador Previous Lawsuits
David Afanador has been an officer since January 2005, according to CAPstat. In 2009, Afanador was named along with several other officers in ‘Williams v. City of New York et al.’ In the complaint, Ranique Williams alleged that the officers targeted her while she was filming them performing a strip. The case was dismissed in 2010.
More allegations of violence
In 2015, Afanador was also named in another lawsuit, ‘Jack et al v. City of New York et al,’ wherein he was named as one of three plainclothes officers who were involved in what was alleged to be a ‘warrantless’ search.
The complaint listed in court documents shows the plaintiff, Charlene Jack alleged that she was told ‘Shut the f**k up you black b***h’ and ‘slammed … into an adjoining wall.’ She also said her sister was being shoved and a male who had arrived and asked the officers to stop was slammed to the ground and cuffed. Jack said none of the officers identified themselves.
Afanador was also caught on video with another officer, Tyrane Isaac, beating and pistol-whipping a 16-year-old suspect in August 2014 so severely the teen suspect’s teeth were cracked.
In that incident, the nydailynews reports both officers — both assigned to the 77th Precinct’s anti-crime unit — were chasing Kaheem Tribble after he was seen throwing away several plastic bags allegedly containing pot.
Video showed the teen slowing down to face the officers with his hands up before they beat him, prosecutors alleged. Afanador was accused of using his service weapon to crack Tribble’s bottom teeth, as Isaac punched him while trying to handcuff him.
Afanador testified at his trial in Brooklyn Supreme Court in 2016 that he didn’t mean to cause Tribble’s injuries, and the teen was caught in lies on the stand.
Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Danny Chun found Afanador and Isaac not guilty.
