Detective Testifies Against N.Y. Cop in Brutality Case
A police officer who broke the “blue wall of silence” on the alleged beating of a Haitian immigrant testified Thursday that he saw a fellow officer wielding a wooden stick allegedly used to sodomize the victim.
Det. Eric Turetzky testified at the trial in Brooklyn federal court of five police officers accused of violating the civil rights of Abner Louima, whose case sparked outraged charges of brutality and racism in the New York Police Department.
Louima testified that on Aug. 9, 1997, two officers beat him in a patrol car after his arrest outside a Brooklyn nightclub and that two other officers took him to a police precinct bathroom, where they held him and rammed a stick in his rectum and into his mouth.
“I don’t know who removed [Louima] from the bathroom, but I remember seeing Officer [Justin] Volpe standing there with a stick,” Turetzky testified.
Former security guard Louima, 32, suffered severe internal injuries that required three operations.
Turetzky, 28, was asked whether he considered himself a hero for breaking the so-called blue wall of silence by coming forward with information.
“No, sir,” he told defense attorney Stephen Worth.
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