Last year, a Manhattan couple sued the city claiming they spent 23 hours in custody for dancing the Charleston on a subway platform. Caroline Stern and boyfriend George Hess had all their charges dropped, and now they've won their lawsuit: the city settled with them for $75,000. City Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. wasn't happy about the decision however: “At $75,000 a dance, the city’s going to go bankrupt sooner than we thought,” he told the Post. “Here, it looks like it was the taxpayers who got served.”
To rewind a bit: Stern and Hess were on their way home in July 2011 from Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Midsummer Night’s Swing when they started doing the Charleston on the platform of the Columbus Circle subway station. Cops told them they couldn't dance on the platform, and when Stern couldn't provide ID (though she did have a credit card with her picture and signature), they were arrested. “We brought out the camera, and that’s when they called backup,” Stern said. “That’s when eight ninja cops came from out of nowhere.” Hess was allegedly tackled, and both were handcuffed.
According to the MTA rules of conduct, it is disorderly conduct to "block free movement on a station, stairway, platform or conveyance"—there is no reference to dancing anywhere in the rules, and considering how much dancing goes on every weekend night, cops would really have to stretch that definition to include the shuffling of feet. And yet, the couple were initially charged with disorderly conduct for “impeding the flow of traffic.”
Stern said she was glad the ordeal was over, but “at the same time, with all the issues with the stopping and frisking people, I think the cops really have to be better trained in dealing with various situations. This was a huge waste of money and time for everybody involved.” Vallone, who heads the City Council’s Public Safety Committee, says the city is too quick to settle these types of cases: “Their policy is to settle regardless of the guilt and just throw taxpayer money out there,” he said.
But Donna Lieberman, head of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said the city was clearly in the wrong in this case, and needs to learn from these suits: “For the city to settle a case, with a wrongful arrest and civil-rights violations for people who were dancing on the subway platform, speaks volumes about policing in the city of New York,” she told the Post.
And yet, the city stubbornly refuses to admit that they were in the wrong in this instance: “Many factors affect the decision to settle a given case, and we decide on an individual basis,” spokeswoman Liz Thomas said, noting the choice to settle doesn't mean cops did anything wrong. “Safety on a subway platform is obviously very important, as these officers were aware,” she added. Perhaps the officers weren't aware that the City is paying out hundreds of millions of dollars in settlement and judgments thanks to a record-high number of lawsuits against the NYPD ($185 million in 2011 alone).
So, in light of this, we encourage everyone to feel free to dance it up underground, whether you're a groovy grandma, an L Train shaman, an adorable little kid, an Irish jigger, a thong dancer, or Thom Yorke. But maybe no dance parties, alright?
