#2903: Rudy Guard's arrest record relevant... (fwd)

[Robert Corbett <bcorbett@netcom.com>]

From:nozier@tradewind.net

I Opened File — Rudy Guard's arrest record relevant, mayor says 
 By TRACEY TULLY and ALICE McQUILLAN  Daily News Staff Writers
Original Publication Date: 03/20/2000 

 Mayor Giuliani yesterday accepted responsibility for releasing the
arrest record of an unarmed security guard shot dead last week during a
struggle with a cop. Giuliani said he authorized Police Commissioner
Howard  Safir to release Patrick Dorismond's record and defended the   
move in response to claims that the security guard is being unfairly
demonized. Speaking on national television, the  mayor said Dorismond's
background was key to understanding his  behavior when he was confronted
 by cops conducting a buy-and-bust drug operation outside the Wakamba
Cocktail Lounge on Eighth Ave.early Thursday.                       
"These things are highly relevant," the mayor said on "Fox News      
Sunday." "You also have the possibility of a pattern of behavior because
several of these arrests involved his punching people in drug
transactions. This is what the police officers alleged happened here,
that [he] attacked the   undercover officer." At another point, he said:
"What you have here is robbery, attempted robbery, possession of a gun
..."

 Interviewer Brit Hume interrupted, asking, "Convictions? convictions?"
"Convictions and arrests, both," Giuliani responded. But as an adult,
Dorismond, 26, had just two convictions for disorderly conduct, the
result of plea bargains in 1993 and 1996. The first was after he was
charged with socking a friend in the nose during a dispute over a small
amount of marijuana; the second was after he allegedly threatened a
motorist with a  gun during a traffic dispute. No gun was found.      
He also has a sealed 1987 robbery and assault case, which occurred when
he was 13, a juvenile. While a police official did not know the outcome
of the case, The Associated Press  has reported that it was dropped.   
Police claim Dorismond took offense when an undercover cop pressed him
about where to buy drugs. Dorismond allegedly threw a punch and then
lunged for the gun of a backup undercover, Anthony Vasquez.            
Yesterday, through his attorney, Vasquez expressed  condolences to
Dorismond's family — but said the gun discharged when Dorismond lunged
at him. Attorney Philip Karasyk said he hasn't decided whether to let
Vasquez testify before a Manhattan grand jury investigating the shooting
of Dorismond.  During the television interview, the mayor also threw
sharp barbs at the Rev. Al Sharpton, who has embraced Dorismond's
family and called for a federal probe. "If you want someone who has a
history of anti-Semitism, intolerance, racial hatred being fomented, you
can't get much worse than Al Sharpton," the mayor said.Sharpton did not
return calls seeking his reaction. At the same time, the head of a black
law enforcement group called for the ending of aggressive narcotics
tactics that he  blamed for Dorismond's death. "This is the first black
man in history who died for just saying  no to drugs," said Lt. Eric
Adams of 100 Blacks in Law  Enforcement.Some of the backups involved in
the deadly encounter — but  not Vasquez or the undercover officer who
initially approached Dorismond — were part of Operation Condor, which
has been credited for driving down crime rates but criticized for
alleged arrest quotas.