Police Commander Undermines Outlaw & Kenney's Tear Gas Alibi

According to Mayor Jim Kenney and Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw, the teargassing of protesters blocking the Vine Street Expressway last year was a decision made solely by a rogue and since-demoted deputy police commissioner.

But a senior police commander testifying in court today punched a few big holes in that alibi.

Inspector Winton Singletary, who on June 1, 2020, was at the Vine Street Expressway before the tear gas canisters were launched, said that former deputy Police Commissioner Dennis Wilson was in "constant contact" that day with the "on-site incident commanders," whom Singletary repeatedly identified as Police Commissioner Outlaw and her boss, Mayor Kenney. 

Singletary further testified that he heard Wilson say over police radio that he had received final approval to tear gas the protesters, an approval that Singelary said came not only from Outlaw, but also the mayor.

Singletary, a 35-yer veteran of the police force and a former SWAT team captain, was testifying in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court today at a preliminary hearing in the case of former SWAT team Officer Richard Nicoletti. Outlaw fired Nicoletti for pepper-spraying three protesters kneeling on the Vine Street Expressway, in the act of illegally blocking that highway during rush hour.

At the close of the hearing, Fortunato Perri, Nicoletti's lawyer, described his client as a "scapegoat for people above him" who were totally inept when it came to defending the city against an invading army of rioters, looters, and arsonists. 

If Nicoletti committed a crime by following the orders of his superiors, Perri said, there ought to be a couple of "co-conspirators" sitting beside Nicoletti at the defense table, representing the "highest levels of leadership" in the city. 

To anybody who was in the courtroom today, it sure seemed that Perri was talking about Kenney and Outlaw, who previously had lied their way out of a political jam last year by pinning all the blame for the Vine Street teargassing on another official scapegoat, former Deputy Police Commissioner Wilson.

Outlaw fired Nicoletti after she said she was "disgusted" by video that showed the SWAT team member pepper-spraying the protesters. In the video, Nicoletti yanked off the goggles of one protester and sprayed him in the face with pepper spray, and then he raised the head of another protester, who was bent over, before firing more pepper spray in the protester's face.

"Police work isn't pretty," Perri said before he put on the stand Sgt. Christopher Binns, who trained Nicoletti. Binns proceeded to explain that everything that Nicoletti did was not only according to police directives, but was also previously and personally authorized by Police Commissioner Outlaw.

Cop-hating District Attorney Larry Krasner previously charged Nicoletti with simple assault, reckless endangerment, official oppression, and possession of an instrument of crime. But on May 18th, Judge William Austin Meehan tossed the charges after he ruled that Nicoletti had done nothing but follow the orders of his superiors.

But Krasner refiled the charges, and this time, he found a judge who agreed with him. 

That would be Judge Crystal Bryant-Powell, who in 2018, was a former employee of Krasner's, working in the D.A.'s office as an assistant district attorney.

At the beginning of the hearing, Judge Bryant-Powell made a big deal out of declaring to Assistant District Attorney Brian Collins that she was "very fond" and "adored Fortunato Perri's father, a since-deceased city judge, who apparently served as a mentor to Bryant-Powell.

The judge told Collins she would entertain a motion for her to recuse herself if Collins considered her affection for Perri's father a possible conflict of interest that might prevent the judge from being fair to the D.A.'s office.

Big laugh there.

But the judge made no mention of a much more real appearance of a conflict of interest, namely her  former status as an employee in the D.A.'s office working under Krasner.

At the end of the two-hour hearing, the judge did Krasner's bidding by reinstating all the charges against Nicoletti that Judge Meehan had previously tossed. 

Then, Judge Bryant-Powell scheduled a Nov. 5 trial date for Nicoletti. The judge who will preside over the trial has not yet been determined.

Let's hope it's not another former Krasner employee like Bryant-Powell.

In his testimony, Inspector Singletary said that a number of police tactics, including the use of tear gas and pepper spray, and previously been approved by the police commissioner during a meeting with the SWAT team and their commanders.

Regarding the use of tear gas, Singletary said, Outlaw wanted to be the one to grant final approval. But the use of pepper spray had already been approved by her, the inspector said, as well as by the mayor. And that no further approval was necessary before Nicoletti came out firing.

"Not only was a crime not committed" by Nicoletti, Perri told the judge, but Nicoletti also "did not violate police directives."

The day of the Vine Street teargassing, hundreds of people protesting the murder of George Floyd in police custody tore down a fence before invading the highway during rush hour, and attacking a police cruiser with a state trooper inside, who had radioed for help.

The orders of the SWAT team that day were to "clear the highway," Inspector Singletary told the judge, by using tear gas and pepper spray against the protesters.

"That crowd would have been the target," Singletary testified.

When Sgt. Binns took the stand, he testified that he had been training the SWAT team for the past 30 years.

If a protester had goggles on, to protect him from pepper spray, Sgt. Binns explained, Nicoletti's duty was to "remove barriers" such as those goggles, before applying the pepper spray directly in the face of the protester.

And if a protester had their head bowed to avoid being gassed, Sgt. Binns explained, Nicoletti was trained to "rock back" the protester "out of that tactical position" and then fire some pepper spray in the protester's face.

Assistant District Attorney Collins, a former public defender who joined the D.A.'s office in 2018, argued that the protesters were peaceful activists who were "sitting there passively" when they were assaulted by at least 60 SWAT team members.

The intent of Nicoletti, ADA Collins somehow divined, was to "inflict bodily harm on the protesters."

Why would Nicoletti, a former Army ranger with three tours of duty in Afghanistan and Iraq, want to inflict bodily harm on some deluded snowflake college kids?

According to ADA Collins, Nicoletti was angry "about the protest that was happening that day."

This was too much even for the pro-Krasner judge, Crystal Bryant Powell.

"You don't know what was in his head," she admonished Collins.

When the day in court ended, the alibi of the police commissioner and mayor was in tatters. It should get nuked at trial. 

So that's why he took the fall for Kenney and Outlaw. 

To further facilitate the cover up, Outlaw has repeatedly refused to be interviewed by the Police Department's Internal Affairs Unit regarding the events of the day of the teargassing on the Vine Street Expressway.

Also, the official police tapes from that day have been removed from public access. But expect some subpoenas to fly before Nicoletti goes on trial for following the orders of his cowardly and back-stabbing superiors.