New York City cops raided a family’s home in Brooklyn at the break of dawn Thursday, handcuffing every family member while searching the apartment unit for three hours before realizing they had the wrong home and leaving.
Next thing the family knew, a photo showing them handcuffed while sitting on the couch appeared on Snapchat with the caption, “Merry Christmas it’s NYPD!”.
Another photo also appeared on Snapchat with the caption “Warrant sweeps Its still a party smh.”
Now internal affairs is investigating, but have refused to release the names of the officers involved.
According to ABC 7, which interviewed the family:
“The worst part was the Snapchats,” Kimberly Santiago said. “That’s what really got to me.”
“The things that he wrote, it’s like, this what you all do?” Santiago said. “If he did that to, picture how many other families he’s done that to. And he was the only one standing there watching us.”
“Ya’ll know that when you came to this house, looking for the wrong person that we don’t even know,” she said.
“We thought he was texting on his phone,” she said. “Because the whole three hours we were sitting here, he was the one standing there. We saw him on his phone, but we didn’t think an officer would do that.”
The photos appeared in the New York Story feed on Snapchat, which is a smartphone app where photos last 24 hours and receives more than a billion views a year, according to Wikipedia, which describes the app as focusing “on the ephemeral nature of fleeting encounters.”
In 2013, Gizmodo reported that Snapchat regularly hands over unopened messages to police to assist them in investigations.
UPDATE: The NYPD has suspended the officer who posted the photos to Snapchat, but still have not released his name, according to the New York Post.
“They broke down the door and shoved a gun in my face and told me not to look up,” resident Eric Almendarez told the Post.
“How are we supposed to get over that?”
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