At New School Protest, Truth Depends on Camera Angle

Students in New York protesting at the New School for Social Research.
Originally uploaded by Pan-African News Wire File Photos

April 12, 2009

At New School Protest, Truth Depends on Camera Angle

By DAVID M. HALBFINGER
New York Times

So much for the camera never lying.

The arrests of protesters who seized a building at the New School on Friday turned into something of a race to YouTube, as sharply contrasting videos recorded by the police and civilians conveyed vastly different impressions of what was going on — and, more specifically, just who was doing what to whom.

As the 22 people who were arrested were arraigned in Manhattan Criminal Court on Saturday afternoon — all were released on their own recognizance — law enforcement officials and civil liberties advocates alike sought to take stock of the dueling videos. They are the latest instant artifacts of a society in which cameras are seemingly omnipresent, but the truth can still remain elusive.

A police videotape, presumably made by the department’s Technical Assistance Response Unit — and posted at its site on YouTube — shows officers calmly entering a room where protesters are seated; the protesters helpfully remove their backpacks and extend their arms to make it easier for the police to handcuff them. The level of politeness on either side seems more appropriate to a tea party.

But two videotapes recorded by people on 14th Street captured a vastly different mood. One, the work of Brandon Jourdan, a freelance journalist, shows officers forcing a door shut against resistance, and spraying pepper spray at those on the inside. It also shows an officer pushing a shouting man in the face and knocking him to the ground before several officers arrest the man — seemingly without provocation.

But yet another videotape, identified on the New School Free Press Web site as the work of a videographer named Chris McCallion, shows demonstrators scuffling with police and at least one of them heaving a metal barricade toward the officers. (The Police Department released a lengthier video from a similar angle, also showing a glimpse of the barricade and a darkly dressed hurler, who scampers away as officers race after him.)

Taken together, it seems the throwing of the barricade may have prompted officers to chase a group of protesters down the street, including whoever threw it, and perhaps including the man who was knocked to the ground.

None of the videos, however, tell the whole story.

“The myth about film is that it’s objective, that film is the camera’s eye, so it’s not prejudiced,” said Paul Chevigny, a New York University law professor involved in litigation against the Police Department over its videotaping of protests like those surrounding the 2004 Republican National Convention.

“But that’s in fact not the case,” he said. “The angle at which a camera is set, or the place where it’s set, and the time where it goes on, and goes off, tends to create an editorial space around the picture. But in fact people nevertheless continue to believe it’s the most reliable evidence of the scene.”

Protesters and onlookers have been policing the police with handheld cameras for some time, as one officer learned last summer after he shoved a man off his bike during a Critical Mass ride, and then lied about it in his paperwork. After the videotape surfaced, the officer was fired.

“Cops are paranoid about it,” said Mike Bosak, a retired sergeant who produces a daily e-mail digest of developments in New York law enforcement. “Lots of times some skell is fighting a cop tooth and nail, then a cop loses control, which is easy to do, and then you lose your temper and somebody videotapes you, and the next thing you know you’re losing your job.”

But with the department now encouraging New Yorkers to send cellphone photos and videos to its Crime Stoppers Web site, criminals are also more likely to be caught in the act.

Yet interpreting the images is not always clear-cut.

Arthur Eisenberg, legal director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said the proliferation of cameras has lent a “Rashomon quality” to the testimony of witnesses to a crime. “The technology may help us come closer to an accurate picture of what happened, but inevitably, just as witnesses with their own eyes are viewing events from their own perspectives, so too are videographers,” he said.

The man knocked to the ground was identified by his lawyer as David Benzaquen, 25, a student at the New School.

Mr. Benzaquen was charged with obstruction of governmental administration, resisting arrest and disorderly conduct, all misdemeanors. The police said he ran into an area that had been barricaded to exclude protesters and then “curled his body up into a ball,” to avoid being handcuffed, according to a criminal complaint against him.

His lawyer, Yetta Kurland, said Mr. Benzaquen had done nothing to warrant the use of force. She also said he had been bloodied and bruised.

Colin Moynihan contributed reporting.