On Saturday, the New York City Police Department antagonized a permitted march and rally against police terror with several legally dubious tactics, as PINAC News [**first reported**](http://photographyisnotacrime.com/2015/10/nypd-arrests-peaceful-protester-carrying-2-y-o-child-10-others-at-riseupoctober-march-against-police-brutality/).
Despite the march and rally being planned for many months and fully permitted by the City, the New York Post ran a cover photo showing one protester giving a cop the finger with the headline, “Same week a cop is killed, protesters ‘F-you’ to the NYPD”
The Post apparently did zero research about the people pictured, because unfortunately for them and the NYPD, they speak volumes about the urgency and necessity for protests against police terror.
The man giving the police the finger (which is well-established, First Amendment protected free speech) is Joshua Lopez, the nephew of John Collado, an unarmed man who was shot and killed by an undercover NYPD cop in 2011 when Collado attempted to break up a fight in front of his house between the undercover cop, named James Connelly, and another man.
The facts of Collado’s case and the lack of justice for his family, including Lopez, are staggering.
First, the NYPD claimed Collado had the officer in a chokehold, lifting him a foot off the ground, but the cop managed to pull out a gun and shoot him in the stomach.
As the [**New York Daily News**](http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/pro-wrestler-john-collado-shot-nypd-cops-dies-family-plans-sue-article-1.957065) reported on September 7, 2011:
> “The cops who responded described him as barely conscious,” Deputy Police Commissioner Paul Browne said of the cop who fired. “He was nearly choked out and his limbs were numb.”
Two days later, the [**Daily News reported**](http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/video-shows-narcotics-not-choked-shot-john-collado-family-claims-article-1.954885) Collado’s family obtained a surveillance video they say shows he was not choking the detective.
That video has not been made been public because a federal lawsuit filed by Collado’s family against the NYPD is still pending. However, [**Connelly was cleared**](http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/grand-jury-won-charge-detective-james-connelly-shooting-death-pro-wrestler-john-collado-article-1.1047167) by a grand jury in 2012.
And earlier this year, it was [**revealed that Connolly had shot and killed**](http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/det-killed-inwood-man-2011-lethal-force-article-1.2281700) another man in 2009 for which he was also cleared.
According to his family, Collado firmly supported and defended the NYPD throughout his life, but after they killed him, the NYPD defamed him.
Now that’s disgraceful.
https://twitter.com/KeeganNYC/status/579708110836768768
Meanwhile, the NYPD officer in the photo is Inspector John D’Adamo, who has quite a sordid history despite rising rapidly through the ranks.
D’Adamo was involved in the notorious Bronx Ticket Fixing Scandal, admittedly and intentionally getting one of his tickets absolved merely for being a cop. But D’Adamo [**doesn’t think it is a big deal**](http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/officer-caught-tape-ticket-fixing-probe-wasn-worried-summons-investigation-article-1.111701) for an officer of the law to blatantly disregard the law.
D’Adamo is also [**being sued in federal court**](http://www.thesandersfirmpc.com/nypd-sergeant-assaulted-by-coworker-files-15-mil-notice-to-sue/) by a fellow NYPD officer for attempted coercion and discriminatory discipline against the officer for speaking up against racist practices in a Bronx Precinct of which D’Adamo was the commanding officer.
His apologetics for racism shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise either, considering his wife [**lied to the NYPD**](http://gothamist.com/2011/02/17/bronx_nypd_wife_caught_in_black_men.php) saying that “black men” assaulted her [**while other cops think**](http://theerant.yuku.com/topic/38808/52-Pct–s-wife-hauled—Psyche-Ward-made–entire-assault-sto?page=1#.Vi472WSrRpg) she was covering for the fact that D’Adamo had actually abused his own wife.
Despite all this, D’Adamo has soared up the ranks of the NYPD. He is now a full Inspector (an appointment made by the Commissioner himself) for the NYPD’s new Strategic Response Group. The NYPD created the Strategic Response Group exclusively to police protests, and has staffed it with other officers with [**sordid histories**](http://gothamist.com/2015/09/23/abu_ghraib_cop_lombardo.php), making civil libertarians extremely concerned that it is just a tool to suppress free speech.
Indeed, that is what we saw Saturday.
As [**we reported**](http://photographyisnotacrime.com/2015/10/nypd-arrests-peaceful-protester-carrying-2-y-o-child-10-others-at-riseupoctober-march-against-police-brutality/), despite the march being fully permitted, the NYPD, staffed almost exclusively by the SRG, thus under the direct command of D’Adamo, almost immediately began provoking the crowd, using various tactics that were uncalled for at best and at worst illegal, directly against family members of people who had been killed by cops, inevitably leading to situations like the one pictured above.
So, who’s the disgrace?
