October 7th, 1992 Buffalo Police Officer Richard C Lopez approached the vehicle of Gregory Johnson, a 23 year old Black man, with his gun drawn. Lopez discharged his gun into Johnson's skull. Johnson died a short time later.

Outcome

The police claimed the lynching was accidental, and on April 7 1993 a grand jury cleared Lopez.

On January 2, 1992 Frank A Nelson, a Black man, was arrested on the same charge for which he had been released approximately 6 hours earlier. Upon his arrival at 40 Delaware Avenue, he was bailed out and released. He was told to pick up his property at 74 Franklin Street. A woman desk officer told him after asking him if he was Frank Nelson, that he had to pick up his property in a back room which she directed him to. On entering the room he spent the next three hours being beaten while handcuffed.

The officers took turns beating up Nelson, and bragged about being able to make him bark like a dog as they punched and kicked him to the floor.

He told them that they made a mistake and that he was released from across the street but they said he thought he was "tough." They moved toward him, calling him racial slurs, and continued to beat him. He attempted to make a break for the door which was slammed shut but was placed in a head-lock, and thrown to the floor on his stomach.

While lying in his hospital bed with a spinal injury, unable to move his legs, Nelson gave an account of how he was beaten with sticks, kicked, choked, and stomped, while handcuffed behind his back, lying on his stomach:

"A white shirt walked in, I looked him right in the face.

'Cover his face, I don't want him to see me. You know what to do,' he screamed.

A cloth was placed over my face. I could feel the barrel of a gun being pushed into my eyeballs;

'Do you like that, n****r?’

At one point, one of them stood on my back and pulled my handcuffed arms up to my head," recounted Nelson.

"They said they were going to kill me like they did somebody named King; I don't remember the first name, but I had no reason to doubt them."

Still handcuffed, Nelson was dragged to an elevator where he was kicked in the throat.

"I tried to get up so they would not kick me in the throat, that's when I realized I couldn't feel my legs."

When the Pre-Trial Services people arrived at about 8:30 a.m., Nelson was lying on the concrete floor in a pool of blood, still handcuffed behind his back, unable to move.

"When I saw the White man. I knew they were back to kill me, but when he identified himself from Pre-Trial, I begged him not to leave me. When he got a closer look, he said, ‘Oh my God.’ He called an ambulance and stayed with me."

Mr. Nelson recalled with tears streaming down his disfigured face, "I owe him my life.”

Because the police have threatened to arrest him in the hospital, unless he signed papers, Nelson said he fears for his life. At one point because of police presence, the hospital had to call headquarters to find out if Nelson was under arrest so that they could move him to the hospital lock-up if such was the case. No one seemed to know if he was under arrest.

Franklin Pratcher, attorney for the family, said that members of the National Bar Association and private sector got together and intended to start bringing cases against this type of brutality.

"Some officers are frustrated with so much crime on the street but others are just prejudiced. They do not see Black people as human beings and don't treat us the same as White people." He went on to say that the big problem is the lack of community out-cry as well as a lack of outrage from the legal community itself.

Frank Nelson was the friend who took in Yolanda Mitchell, who was paralyzed in the July 1992 shooting on Carlton St. in the Children’s Park. He was her sole helper. While still in a wheelchair, she was largely unable to do for herself. Following the beating by Buffalo police, Mr. Nelson occupied a room on the same floor facing the same fate.

Shortly after 10 PM on the night of December 5th, 1991 Detective Mark Lauber of the Buffalo Police Department shot Paul Mills, a 19 year old Black student of Erie County Community College, as he ran away from the detective. Paul was the second youngest of Bobby and Ann Mills' four children.

Mills was shot by the detective while he was in plain clothes with the departments destructive 9-millimeter gun under the left arm. The bullet traveled downward, damaging his lungs, liver and spleen before exiting his right side just above the hip. Based on the entrance of the bullet, it's reasonable to assume Mills had his left arm up when he was shot.

According to police account, Mills allegedly pulled a gun on the detective prior to fleeing. Mills proceeded to run away from police through a yard on Cambridge Ave fearing for his life and collapsed in the front yard of a residence on Cornwall Ave. A search of the area that night, by police, failed to turn up any weapon. However, police alleged that approximately 24hrs later, a gun was found on the roof of a shed in the rear of the Cambridge Ave yard. The Buffalo Police Commissioner did not say if fingerprints were found on the gun.

A Buffalo resident said that Mills laid on Cornwall after collapsing for nearly 20 minutes before he was picked up by an ambulance and transported to Erie County Medical Center. The witness said, "He lost a lot of blood, you could see it now if not for the snow."

An unnamed police officer said that, "Lauber is one of the good Irish Catholic boys from South Buffalo, and Dillon(the DA at the time) is not going to hurt him."

Thomas Grillo, a retired Buffalo police officer, was arrested for attacking a man with a tire iron and threatening to shoot him with a loaded revolver during an apparent traffic dispute. Grillo was accused of smashing the window of the driver's car with a tire iron and hitting the driver. He was also accused of pointing a loaded .38-caliber revolver at the driver's head.

Outcome

Grillo was charged with assault, first-degree reckless endangerment, possession of a weapon and criminal mischief.

Terrance Robinson, an off-duty Buffalo Police Officer, went to assist another off-duty officer who was working as a restaurant security guard around 3:00 AM on October 22nd, 1989. The officers restrained Anthony Williams, 20, with handcuffs and then Officer Robinson pulled his gun out and placed it against Williams' head. Officer Robinson threatened to blow Williams brains out if he moved while Williams was in handcuffs. There is some dispute whether Williams yelled or moved his head, but after he did, Officer Robinson's gun went off, shooting Williams in the head.

The shooting occurred about four hours after Robinson told police superiors he was too sick to work his normal shift.

Williams, shot once in the right temple, died three days later.

Outcome

A grand jury was assigned to investigate the fatal shooting.

Buffalo Police Officer Terrence Robinson was arrested following his indictment on a second-degree manslaughter charge in the fatal shooting of Anthony Williams. The indictment also charged Robinson with prohibited use of a firearm in the death of Williams. Robinson was allowed to remain free on his own recognizance after he pleaded innocent. Assigned to administrative duties since the shooting, Robinson was suspended without pay and later formerly fired from the department after his conviction.

State Supreme Court Justice Julian F. Kubiniec told the police officer he was "responsible for the consequences" of drawing his weapon. Kubiniec imposed the maximum-permitted term on Robinson of 5 to 15 years.

"There was no reason ever for you to pull that weapon out," Kubiniec said in rebuking the five-year police officer for drawing one of his two service revolvers.

Buffalo Police Officer Cedric Holloway responded to a 911 call from Darlene Brantley arising from a dispute she had with her ex-boyfriend, during the morning hours of September 2, 1989. Holloway claimed he saw Brantley with a knife and responded by shooting and killing Brantley, a Black 31 year old mother of a 9-year-old boy. Officer Holloway shot Brantley through the open window of his police vehicle.

Brantley was the first Black woman ever killed by an on-duty Black officer in the Buffalo Police Department. She was also the first person to be killed by the department's new automatic weapon, the 9-millimeter. The bullet from the gun tore through her abdominal organs, damaging her liver, lungs and spleen before exiting her left side. For eleven months she struggled to live as a patient at ECMC's intensive care unit. She died on July 23, 1990.

On May 6th, 1989 Buffalo police shot and killed Curtiss Fisher.

According to city of Rochester court proceedings for P.S.S. Case 86-1207, Gary Galetta responded as a plainclothes officer to a burglary report along with three uniformed officer. The victim was apprehended as a suspect by the four officers, and Galetta kicked the victim in the side and head while they were on the ground.

Outcome

RPD suspended Gary Galetta without pay for 20 days. This suspension was satisfied with time from the Gary Galetta's compensatory time bank.

On August 7, 1981, the gay rights activist Bob Uplinger was arrested on the corner of North Street and Irving Place in Buffalo for inviting an undercover police officer back to his apartment. Convinced his arrest was unjust, Uplinger fought the state loitering laws that enabled police to entrap gay men and criminalize their sexuality.

The result: a historical verdict in the New York State Court of Appeals, and one of the first gay rights cases to ever appear before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Source: Buffalo-Niagara LGBTQ History Project

Tony Vives, a young Puerto Rican man, was murdered by Buffalo Police at Precinct No. 7 in the old First Ward after being brutally beaten and arrested on false charges of "creating a disturbance" and "resisting arrest." During this time, the old First Ward was a community of poor white, Black, and Puerto Rican people.

Vives was arrested by officer Terry Adams on September 8th while relaxing with some friends on the front steps of a house at Fulton Street and Red Jacket Street. Adams chased Vives into the house, and threatened, "I'll blow your brains out right now." Officer Adams had previously been heard telling Vives on several occasions, "I'm gonna get you," according to many of his friends.

Vives asked repeatedly why he was being arrested, but was answered only with beatings from Adam's large metal flashlight. The owner of the house stopped Adams from shooting Vives on the spot and ordered him out of the house. After calling for backup, Adams returned to handcuff Vives and take him away.

The community reacted immediately to the senselessness of the arrest. Several people went down to the precinct, where they were told of Vives' death. The police claimed it was suicide.

News of the murder sparked two nights of militants protests. Residents took to the streets throwing debris at cops, tossing firebombs at the police station, and spray painting Vives' name, "No. Seven are murderers," and "Pay back" all over the area.

Precinct 7 had a long and notorious record of harassing the community.

Richard Long, an 18 year old from North Buffalo planning his first semester at Buffalo State College, was dragged from his brother’s car at 2:30 a.m. on June 25, 1977, beaten and stomped to death by two police officers (Philip Gramaglia and Gary Atti) and a Buffalo businessman (Jack Giammaresi). The three were charged with first degree manslaughter.

The beating was precipitated by a traffic incident, in which Long, driving home after a party, cut off Gramaglia and Atti (who had also been celebrating). The two policemen bragged to their friends about the beating afterwards, over drinks at Mulligans. They never attempted to deny their actions, as this chilling testimony from the trial transcript demonstrates:

“Q. He went down?

A [Gramaglia]. Yes, sir.

Q. What did you do?

A. When he was down, or when he was going down, or just about all the way down, I kicked him.

...

A [Atti]: ...Phil reached down and grabbed him by his shirt and tried to pull, lift him up, and the kid says ‘No,’ so then I started to holler ‘Get up, get up,’ and he wouldn’t get up, and I gave him a quick kick to what I believe is the top of the head.

Q. Then what happened?

A. Well, I believe we were still hollering to get up, and I kicked him again.”

(from Buffalo News, June 25, 1987)

Long drowned in his own blood. Most of the testimony in the trial revolved around whether other officers had been involved, and, although many people still believe there were more, in the end only Gramaglia, Atti, and Giammaresi were convicted. After a relatively painless 18 month stretch in a minimum security facility, the three resumed their lives in Buffalo. This relatively mild verdict was condemned by many.

The Long trial was front page news in Buffalo for months, and was instrumental in ending the mayoral career of Stanley Makowski, making room for then State Senator Jimmy Griffin. Makowski’s police chief, Thomas Blair, left with him.

On August 22, 1974 William Johnson Jr. was stopped for a traffic check and was told there was a warrant out for his arrest. Johnson was arrested and taken to Precinct 12. While being booked a group of Buffalo Police officers, including McParlene, Sonberg, Bohen, and Dougherty, surrounded him, lifted him in the air, threw him on a table from which he fell onto the floor, and beat him. During this, Johnson's sister was yelling at the police to leave her brother alone.

Following the assault Johnson was booked and taken to the Precinct 3 cell block, since the cells in Precinct 12 has been condemned for a year at that point.

After midnight, a group of police approached Johnson's cell and told him to come out or they would come and get him. The police unlocked his cell, took Johnson out, and attacked him with a blackjack while the other officers continued beating him. Johnson blacked out and when he came to, Officers O'Malley and McParlene punched him back into his cell.

Around midnight on August 23rd, Johnson went back to Precinct 12 to retrieve his possessions that has been seized when he was arrested the previous night. Technician Dougherty confronted him in the station house and told him, "You think you're a tough guy. I ain't gonna give you shit." And Johnson told Dougherty he could take his things and "shove them up your ass," and then proceeded to walk out of the precinct. Dougherty followed him, yelling, "Hey punk...hey you tough guy...come here..." all the way into the street. Johnson turned and ran, and Officer Bohen thre his nightstick and hit Johnson on the head. The officers caught him, beat him, smashed his head into the ground, and handcuffed him. Johnson was then dragged to the precinct and booked for disorderly conduct and resisting arrest.

In the morning, Johnson went to the hospital, where he stayed for three days. Hospital records indicated that he had a fractured vertebrae, multiple bruises and swelling all over his back, front legs and arms, bruised ribs, numb fingers, blurred vision, and facial contusions.

Outcome

On October 24, in City Court, before Judge Honan, all charges against the seven police officers and one civilian police employee were dropped.

On April 7th, 1974 Buffalo police officers John Wickerd and Louis Reiner beat David Battie, 32, with a flashlight. The beating caused wounds that required 28 stitches.

David went to the side door of his home, discovered he didn't have his key and was exiting from an alley en route to the front door when a flashlight focused on him. The police asked him for identification, and when he told them it was in his car the police began beating him over the head with the flashlight.

Outcome

David was initially charged with refusing the reasonable request of a police officer and resisting arrest, but both charges were dismissed. David sued the City of Buffalo and the two police officers for damages, and was awarded $4,500.

On Saturday, July 8th, 1972, the Buffalo unit of the American Communist Workers Movement(Marxist-Leninist)ACWM(M-L) opened the William Z Foster Center on 850 Tonawanda Street, centered directly in the heart of the working class district of Buffalo known as Riverside. The purpose of this center was to serve the working class of Buffalo by providing a local point of revolutionary proletarian activity through the dissemination of revolutionary literature. The center also contained a library of revolutionary works and served as an excellent location for mass meetings.

The afternoon of July 8th, several members of the Communist Party of Canada(Marxist-Leninist) joined their American Comrades in distributing the first issue of the Buffalo Red Star, as well as a leaflet celebrating the opening of the center itself. Everywhere comrades went, they were enthusiastically received by the people of Buffalo, who were eager to buy the paper and warmly greet the community. Hundreds of copies were sold within only a few hours. While the communists were engaged in mass work, Buffalo Police began to harass them and tried to suppress their fundamental right to disseminate literature. In various areas of the city, the police attempted to stop the distribution of the revolutionary leaflet announcing the opening of the center and the sale of the first local communist newspaper in Buffalo. In the Cheektowaga area, Buffalo Police arrested one American comrade and arrested, deported, and turned over to Canadian authorities two Canadian comrades for taking part in propaganda work.

Saturday evening, close to 50 people from the Riverside community and other working and oppressed people from Buffalo and many fraternal comrades from Canada attended the grand opening of the Williams Z Foster Center, Revolutionary Propaganda Center of the working class. During the course of the meeting, police cars gathered in front of and down the street from the center and the police several times engineered various disruptions of the meeting by mobilizing and uniting with a handful of local fascist elements to shout obscenities and try to enter the center and disrupt the meeting. At one point an off-duty Buffalo Police Officer demanded to see a license permitting them to operate such a Center. Once the proper paperwork was presented, he retreated to join the other “off-duty” Buffalo Police Officers sitting in their marked and unmarked vehicles.

One police collaborator proceeded to go around to the back of the bookstore and pile his garbage on the back doorstep and set it on fire. Several American comrades quickly put out the fire and removed the collaborator from the scene. Immediately two uniformed police man, shouted “You are under arrest” to the two comrades who had stopped this arsonist, and physically assaulted the comrades. The comrades resisted this attack and the one officer pulled out his gun and fired a “warning” shot into the air. When this failed to cower the comrades, he pointed his pistol at one of the American comrade’s head. With the aid of fellow Buffalo Police Officers, they then jumped upon the comrades, kicking and finally handcuffing them.

By this time the rest of the more than 50 people who had been at the evening ceremonies rushed out to give aid, and several more comrades were arrested. One comrade in the back of the patrol car again openly defied their brutality and repression and led all comrades in the singing of the Internationale. Within a couple of minutes, several more police cars and several paddy wagons had arrived. However, their sirens had brought with them the attention of several hundred people from the surrounding community.

With a fist in the air, one comrade shouted, “Death to the American monopoly capitalist class! Long live the American working class!” A Buffalo Police Officer “ordered” him to lower his fist and refrain from shouting death to the monopoly capitalist class. He refused and a “warning shot” was fired. One Buffalo Police Officer put his pistol to the temple of the comrade and threaten him with death. The comrade kept his first high, shouted slogans and challenged the officer to carry out his threat. Then a pack of Buffalo Police Officers jumped on the comrade, arrested him, and charged with “inciting a riot” and second “second-degree assault.”

The police switched their tactics, and claimed to all that they were protecting the communist from the attacks of the “people.” One Buffalo Police Officer arrested one American comrade taking part in one of the dozens of mass demonstrations which were springing up all over the neighborhood led by comrades from both countries, claiming that if the comrade didn't want to get “protected” (i.e. leave the people and hide in the Center), then he would arrest the comrade, which he proceeded to do when the comrade refused to budge. This is what police call “protective custody.”

Within minutes news of the fascist attack has spread throughout the neighborhood. Two blocks away, a bartender and several customers were overheard denouncing the police for the fascist attack, and the spirit and evidence there, like that overwhelmingly shown in dozens of discussions with the people who actually witnessed this fascist attack, was that the police and no one else was responsible for the violence, and that the Center had every right to exist.

The American comrades quickly prepared for any other attacks that the fascist Buffalo Police and their collaborators might make during the night, and began to write a leaflet to be distributed the very next morning to the broad masses of the neighborhood, stating that the entire attack, the entire assault was planned by the Buffalo Police and that the arsonist collaborator was nothing more than a footman of the police. In doing so the American comrades would actively combat the propaganda that the police were mounting that the attack was:

(a) an attack of the “people” on the communists, and

(b) that they (the police) were protecting the communists despite the latter’s protests.

The Buffalo news media the very next day clearly showed their class basis in reporting word for word the hysterics of the police.

Buffalo City Court marshals, assisted by Buffalo police, and workmen hired by a landlord, evicted the National Committee to Combat Facism(NCCF), an arm of the Black Panther Party(BPP) from its rented headquarters at 299 E Ferry St on December 2nd, 1970.

Police and city marshals arrived at the building at around 10:30 a.m. with a court order for eviction signed by James Arkeilpane, the landlord, who claimed the tennants were three months behind on rent.

NCCF/BPP said they were on a rent strike because of poor condition of the building, citing rats, poor plumbing and bad lighting.

Captain Frank Piracci of the Cold Spring Station said the city marshals requested police to accompany them. Also at the scene was Captain Floyd Edwards, although he was on vacation.

No one was charged and Capt. Piracci said the weapons and ammunition that were taken for law enforcement's own protection. He said that the man in possession of the weapons was not in violation of the law.

299 E Ferry was demolished and an empty lot is in its place today.

Buffalo police and FBI agents raided the Black Panther headquarters located at 299 E Ferry St on the afternoon of November 11th, 1970. The police arrested Sherry Lynn Brown, 22, who was allegedly wanted on a fugitive warrant from Baltimore, and officers seized a small cache of arms and ammunition.

Officers who took part in the investigation and the raid include Buffalo Chief of Detectives Ralph V Degenhart, Special Agent in charge of the FBI in Buffalo Karl L Brouse, Detective Joseph Giambra, Buffalo Police Intelligence Unit Captain Kevin Harmon, Buffalo C District Detectives Anthony Bielli and James Reardon.

Buffalo police officers Joseph Ransford and Lawrence Manno of the Tactical Patrol Unit arrested Kevin M Blackford, 22, of the Black Panther Party, at gunpoint at 11 PM on September 8th, 1970.

Blackford was approaching the local headquarters of the Black Panther party and Citizens to Combat Fascism headquarters at 299 E Ferry St. Blackford carried a loaded bolt action shotgun and a bandolier with 18 shells across his chest. He was charged with possession of a loaded firearm.

Blackford was acquitted of the charges.

On May 7, 1970, police filled the student union with tear gas and twelve students were wounded by birdshot. Teargas was used to disperse 500 students gathered near Baird (now Allen) Hall.

"It felt like a war zone," says James E. Brennan, editor in chief of the Spectrum, UB's student newspaper, during the riot era.

"I purchased 10 gas masks for our reporters so they could work. The police were lobbing so many tear gas canisters. We put air conditioning units in the print offices of the Spectrum, because the police were shooting tear gas in the windows of the student union. We took the staff down to the basement, put the gas masks on, went up, turned the air conditioners on, aired out the offices and put out an extra edition."

Getting gassed, he recalls, "was like getting pepper thrown in your eyes. It had an acrid, sharp smell, worse than onions." At age 20, "you feel invincible. Until I saw kids lying on the floor in the student union with that birdshot in their skin. A year later the FBI cleared the Buffalo Police of firing a birdshot at protesting UB students.

On May 5th, 2,000 students from UB, Buffalo State College Canisius College, and local high school students were tear gassed by the Buffalo Police as they marched down Main Street toward downtown Buffalo. This was the first time teargas was deployed against protesters in Buffalo.

The marchers were protesting the invasion of Cambodia by the United States and the killing of four and woundings of ten student protesters at Kent State University. In addition to the four murdered at Kent State on May 4, two people were murdered and twelve were wounded at Jackson State on May 14th, six Black people were murdered and twenty were wounded in Augusta, Georgia, eleven students were bayoneted at the University of New Mexico, and twenty people suffered shotgun wounds at Ohio State.

At a rally on March 11, 1970 the Strike Committee at the University at Buffalo issued an ultimatum to the university administration: "meet the strike demands by 9:00 p.m. the next day or face the outcome of a War Council." The Strike Committee demanded that the Buffalo Police leave campus, unconditional amnesty be given to all protesting students and an end to the ROTC program at UB.

Acting President Regan announced that a phased withdrawal of the Buffalo Police would begin March 17 in response.

On Thursday, March 12th, 1,000-1,500 people attended a nighttime rally on campus. Mixed among the UB students were students from other colleges, high school students and other members of the local community. The War Council began when the rally convened at Clark Gym. Demonstrators burned a bed sheet painted to resemble the American flag and chanted slogans in support of North Vietnam. Protesters then began to throw rocks, ice and other items at police officers gathered nearby.

The protesters moved from Clark Gym to Hayes Hall where they confronted 200 police who were lined up in front of the building. Both sides jeered at and taunted the other before the protesters moved on to the Themis site. Protesters threw rocks at windows at the Themis site and were confronted by 75 police officers.

Approximately 1,000 protesters returned to Hayes Hall and again confronted the 200 police officers there. Rocks were thrown by protesters at already broken Hayes Hall windows, showering nearby police with glass. At this point, a number of officers charged the crowd and began to beat protesters, members of the Peace Patrol and non-protesting bystanders.

12 people were shot and 58 people were injured. Some received treatment from Student Health Services, while others were taken by ambulances to area hospitals. Six people were arrested.

Themis was a research project conducted by faculty from the Department of Physiology and was funded by the Department of Defense.