DeStefano: We Shouldn’t Have Sent SWAT Team

It was a mistake to send SWAT cops into a private Yale party, but police may have had a good reason for demanding that students stay off their cell phones.

Mayor John DeStefano offered that latest take on a now nationally-discussed raid of a downtown club as 30 students filed civilian complaints of police misconduct — and new details emerged about the police versions in two other ​“Operation Nightlife” incidents under internal investigation.

DeStefano referred to last weekend’s police raid of a private Yale dance at the Elevate nightclub on College Street. Police, including two heavily armed SWAT officers, stormed the club at 12:50 a.m. on Oct. 2 and made five arrests while commanding students to stay off cell phones. The incident sparked a storm of protest from undergraduates who say they were mistreated by overly aggressive police officers.

It was one of three cases in which police have come under fire for treatment of civilians since launching the ​“Operation Nightlife” crackdown in the downtown club district in the wake of a shoot-out between citizens and police. The police have launched internal investigations into two of those incidents.

Police reports obtained Thursday shed light on the police response in two of those cases: Officers wrote that a Quinnipiac student was interfering them after a friend’s arrest inside Toad’s Place, and that a motorcyclist looked like he was about to flee after being stopped on Crown Street with a noisy hog.

But the city has refused to provide many details of the Elevate raid routinely offered immediately after arrests, even arrests that involve further ​“investigation,” as most do. Chief Administrative Officer Rob Smuts said Thursday that the city’s corporation counsel needs to weigh in on whether the reports can be released while an investigation is underway.

The mayor did offer some new thoughts about the cops’ strategy in that incident.

“I didn’t think it was a good idea” to send in SWAT to begin with, DeStefano said. The specially trained officers, armed with assault rifles, are designed to intimidate and were not appropriate to the situation, he said.

The mayor also provided a tentative explanation for why police told people in the club to put their cell phones away. It was a measure to ensure the situation didn’t escalate, DeStefano said.

The interaction of police and cell phones is a currently fraught subject, in part because of another police action last weekend, in which a Quinnipiac University student was allegedly arrested while videotaping police arrest his friend outside Toad’s Place on York Street.

The Connecticut ACLU issued a statement Thursday condemning the police officers’ alleged prohibition of using cell phones to record events inside Elevate as a violation of students’ First Amendment rights to record and broadcast police conduct.

At least one student did manage to record video inside the club, capturing footage of a cops shouting ​“Who’s next?” and ​“Anybody else?” after detaining a student. Click the play arrow to watch.

Officials, meanwhile, addressed concerns about the raid during a standing-room-only question and answer session with Yale students on Thursday afternoon in the library of Dwight Hall on High Street.

After an introduction by Alderman Mike Jones (who’s a Yale student), Smuts and police internal affairs head Capt. Denise Blanchard spent over an hour answering questions in a room packed with dozens of Yalies. It was the second public event this week organized by Yale students calling for police to investigate the raid on Elevate.

Smuts and Blanchard assured the students that the police department takes all complaints seriously and is making a thorough investigation.

“We’re there to listen to you,” said Capt. Blanchard. ​“We need to know what happened.” As she spoke, Yale students were busy completing complaint forms about their experiences of the raid. Blanchard collected about 30 such forms at the end of the meeting.

One student asked a question about police policy on cell phone use. Smuts replied that using a cell phone to take pictures or videos of officers in a public space is legal and not a problem. It can be a different situation, however, ​“in a confined space where officers are trying to establish order.”

He described a hypothetical instance where police could be justified in ordering people not to use cell phones. Two weekends ago, police were doing an inspection of a club on East Street, he said. While officers were busy in one room, people were leaving the club through a fire door in another room, Smuts said. They weren’t leaving because people in the first room had texted them, but that’s the kind of situation where that kind of coordination could happen and police might need to control phone use, Smuts said.

“It’s about being able to coordinate behavior in a large group,” Smuts said. He said the police department needs to review its specific policies on cell phone use during police actions to clarify procedures during situations like the one he described.

Smuts stressed that his discussion of why police might restrict phone use was purely hypothetical and not an explanation of what happened at Elevate.

Mayor DeStefano, at unrelated event downtown Thursday (the opening of the new Devil’s Gear bike shop in Pitkin Plaza), gave a similar explanation for police restriction of cell phone use. It was ​“how not to escalate the situation,” he said. ​“So [people] won’t call other people to a situation to aggravate it.”

DeStefano said his explanation is not the final word, as an investigation into the raid is underway.

He did have a firm conclusion about the role of inject a SWAT team into a nonviolent gathering in a private club.

“I think SWAT, by design and by training, is meant to be intimidating. It creates a different impression of what is going on, and creates confusion,” DeStefano said. ​“It was an intimidating experience.”

After speaking with Yale students Thursday, Smuts said the police department has made some changes in response to three internal affairs investigations prompted by incidents within a period of 10 days after the start of Operation Nightlife. ​“We’ve redesigned the operation with that in mind.” Smuts declined to go into the details of changes beyond saying that the legal right to video and photograph cops has been clarified with officers. Click here for a story in which the police chief talks about those efforts.

Cops: Big Tone Was Ready To Bolt

Mark ​“Big Tone” Maloney, the biker who said he was assaulted by a cop who was giving him a ticket, was on hand for the Yale student discussion with Rob Smuts, wearing the seal of his motorcycle club, the Presidents. He said he thought it was a good event, but said he wants to hear more about police policies on use of force when conducting traffic stops.

Maloney said a police officer swore at him on Sept. 23 on Crown Street and grabbed his face, ripping off his wind mask and crushing his prescription glasses.

The police side of the story of Maloney’s arrest is spelled out in an incident report drafted by Officer Scott Durken on Sept. 29, six days after his interaction with Maloney.

Here’s what happened, according to Durken’s report:

At about 11:15 p.m., Durken was standing at the corner of Crown and Temple Streets when several motorcycles passed by headed west on Crown. Durken had seen them go around the block a few times, creating a lot of noise.

As the bikes passed by Durken, ​“one in particular looked right at these officers and began to throttle the motorcycle,” he wrote. It was so loud that he couldn’t hear his police radio. ​“It was determined that a motor vehicle stop should ensue,” he wrote.

Minutes later, other officers stopped the bikes near 216 Crown St., Hula Hank’s nightclub, where the bikers were parking. Durken approached and saw an officer talking to the biker who had looked at him and revved his engine. ​“It appeared that this operator was not complying with the officer,” Durken wrote. As Durken approached, the biker put his hand on the bars and his foot on the bike ​“as if he was going to flee.”

“The operator was clad in a full face mask and in fear that he may flee, I removed it so he could be identified,” Durken wrote. ​“This identification needed to be made, because a police pursuit would not be warranted at this time. It should be noted that motorcycle operators will flee from the police from stopped positions, knowing that motorcycles are more powerful than the police cruisers and will elude capture.”

The biker then put his hand inside his coat. ​“For officer safety, I ordered him off the bike and began to utilize pat down procedures in fear he may have a weapon.”

After a check of license and registration and a pistol permit, and securing a handgun in Maloney’s bike, Malone was released from handcuffs and issued a ticket for excessive noise. His gun was returned to him.

Durken’s report makes no mention of Maloney’s allegations that the officer crushed his glasses, swore at him, searched him illegally, or threatened to crack his skull.

Cops: Kenneth Was Interfering

The third club-related incident under investigation by Internal Affairs is the arrest of a Quinnipiac University student named Kenneth on Saturday Sept. 25.

The Quinnipiac Chronicle reported that Kenneth was arrested that night outside Toad’s Place on York Street for videotaping police who were arresting another Quinnipiac student. Click the play arrow to watch that video, which shows officers using expletives with Kenneth and telling him to put the phone away.

Cops said he was interfering with police work. Kenneth was charged with that offense and disorderly conduct.

Here’s what happened, according to incident reports written by Officers Craig Miller and David Totino:

Officer Miller was working an extra duty shift at Toad’s. At about 11:50 p.m., a bouncer called him over to the left entrance door and said he’d been smacked in the face, where he had a red mark. The bouncer pointed out the guy who did it. With slurred speech, the guy denied striking the bouncer. Miller arrested him.

While Miller and Totino had the guy in handcuffs, his friends came up and started yelling and complaining about a false arrest. Police ordered the friends not to interfere. They all obeyed, except Kenneth.

After ignoring several orders to stop interfering, Kenneth started videotaping police with his cellphone.

“Kenneth began yelling at these officers asking to know what his friend was being charged with,” Totino wrote. ​“Kenneth then took his cellphone [and] walked behind Officer Miller who was unaware what Kenneth was doing. I approached Kenneth asked him to place his hand behind his back, but he refused. I grabbed Kenneth by his shirt and forcefully put him face down onto the ground. Kenneth continued to struggle with us, and Officer Miller and I finally got him into handcuffs after several attempts.”

At the end of his report, Totino writes, ​“It should be known that during the altercation Kenneth was approaching these officers so closely that we could not properly monitor Officer Miller’s arrestee.”

Melissa Bailey contributed reporting.