Prosecution of Teen Allegedly Caught in Philly Cop’s Genital

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Prosecution of Teen Allegedly Caught in Philly Cop’s Genital Squeeze Called Unfair

January 23, 2014 1:18 PM



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By Cherri Gregg
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — A juvenile court judge today set a trial date in the case of 16-year-old Darrin Manning, who is charged with misdemeanors stemming from a January 7th incident in which he was stopped by police and frisked.
But the straight-A student claims he is the victim. He says a Philadelphia police officer sexually assaulted him during the patdown, leaving him with injuries that could mean he’s unable to father children.
Watch the Surveillance Video
Today, dozens of people sat in the waiting room of Philadelphia Family Court to support Darrin Manning.
A student at Mathematics Civics and Sciences Charter High School, near Broad and Girard, Manning claims he was on his way to a basketball game when officers stopped and frisked him, squeezing his genitals so hard that he required emergency surgery for a ruptured testicle.
The judge set a March 7th trial date to give prosecutors time to gather evidence.
Afterward, Manning’s mother was upset that the case against her son is moving forward.
“I’m not pleased at all — I feel like the charges should have been dropped today,” said Ikea Coney. Then, with tears coming down her face, she added, “Because my son doesn’t deserve this, he’s a good child.”
Manning’s attorney, Lewis Small, refuses to let his client speak to police and is calling for a federal investigation.
“We want the charges dropped, and we want the officers who did this appropriately punished,” he said.
Small claims that Manning’s arrest and patdown violates civil rights law as well as a 2011 settlement agreement between the City of Philadelphia and a group of plaintiffs who claimed the Philadelphia Police Department’s “stop and frisk” practices violate the US and Pennsylvania constitutions.
Read the Settlement Agreement (.pdf format)
“They are not allowed to frisk an individual unless they have reasonable suspicion that he is armed and dangerous,” Small says, “and this is certainly not the case here.”
Both the police and Lewis have said there are other witnesses to the incident, but none have been identified at this point.
Police commissioner Charles Ramsey announced last Friday that the department was investigating the incident. During that press conference he showed a surveillance video that captured some of the incident (see related story).
Watch the Surveillance Video
Manning’s attorney has not yet filed a formal complaint with the police department’s internal affairs unit in connection with the incident, citing the pending criminal charges against his client as the reason for the holdup.
Ramsey says facts are unclear at this point and has requested a meeting with Manning and his attorney.

[Jangle]

Darrin Manning, Pa. Teen, Allegedly Has Testicle Ruptured By Cop

The Huffington Post | By Sebastian Murdock Posted: 01/23/2014 12:40 pm EST | Updated: 01/23/2014 2:59 pm EST







MyFoxPhilly
Darrin Manning is wheeled away by his mother after suffering a ruptured testicle.




Pennsylvania teenager Darrin Manning started his day excited to play in a basketball game. It ended with the 16-year-old under arrest and in excruciating pain in a horrific case of alleged police brutality, now under investigation by Internal Affairs.
Philly.com reported the Jan. 7 ordeal, when Manning and the other members of his high school basketball team got off a bus to go face their rivals.
Veronica Joyner, founder of the Mathematics, Civics & Sciences Charter School in Philadelphia, gave her student athletes hats, gloves and scarves on the especially cold day.
As the students were walking into the gym to play their game, Manning said that one of his teammates may have made a snide remark to Officer Thomas Purcell with the Philadelphia Police Department, who was on patrol in the area.
The officer began walking towards the group, and the kids sprinted away. Manning told Philly.com he started running too, but then stopped.
"I didn't do anything wrong," Manning told the publication.
According to a police report, Purcell stopped Thomas after he said he saw a group of black males running away with ski masks. The students said they were wearing scarves, not ski masks.
Soon after being stopped, Manning -- who has no history of discipline problems and is a straight-A student -- was arrested for aggravated assault, resisting arrest, and reckless endangerment, My Fox Philly first reported.
According to the report, Manning allegedly fought with the officer, hitting him three times and ripping off his radio. Despite this, the report says "no injuries sustained to police."
Manning said a female officer came to pat him down as he was being arrested. Manning claims he was sexually assaulted and brutalized by that officer, who has not been named.
"She patted me down and then she touched my butt and then my private parts," he said. "And then she grabbed and squeezed and pulled my private parts and I felt something pop."
Manning suffered a ruptured testicle and screamed in pain. The following day, he underwent emergency surgery and is now in a wheelchair as he recovers.
His mother, Ikea Coney, said the injury may prevent her son from fathering children.
"I blame myself," Coney said. "I taught my son to respect cops, not to fear them. Maybe if he was afraid, he would have run like the other boys and he would have been okay."
As part of the Internal Affairs investigation, police said they wanted to speak to Manning. The teen's attorney, Lewis Small, said that is out of the question.
"I'm not going to allow my client to sit down and give a written statement," Small said. "That's in effect malpractice by any attorney while criminal charges are outstanding."
The family is fighting to get rid of Manning's criminal charges before they take further action regarding the alleged brutality.
Police are declining to comment on the incident while the investigation continues.
According to records from Internal Affairs obtained by Philly.com, Officer Purcell has had complaints in the past regarding false arrests. In a 2008 and 2009 case, he was cleared of any wrongdoing.
Manning spent eight hours in jail before being released. When basketball coach Dan Jackson went to the station to check on his player, he asked the cops why they went to such extremes.
"If this was St. Joe's Prep, would the same measures have been taken that you took on my boys?" Jackson asked.
He said the officers in the station ignored his question.