Ray Lewis on MSNBC

MSNBC's Chris Hayes was practically giddy with excitement this Saturday morning. Not only had the morning news host snagged retired Philadelphia police Captain Ray Lewis (whose arrest during Occupy Wall Street's "Day of Action" last week made for some great copy and even better photojournalism), but he was able to start off his segment with a bunch of Star Wars references. Zoinkers!

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Captain Lewis seemed unamused by Mr. Hayes enthusiasm: not only does he correct the host on his date of arrival at Zuccotti ("I didn't come down Thursday, I came down Monday to assist the movement"), but he drops a big wet blanket on the leading question of his treatment at the hands of the NYPD.

Chris Hayes: The question that I guess that I'm dying to know is what your interactions with the NYPD was like. Presumably it was a little different than if I had been down there arrested, or someone else. Obviously, you were dressed like this...what was the interaction like?

Captain Ray Lewis: It was exemplary professional conduct, with me and every protester that I witnessed.

Chris Hayes: Ah. Interesting.

This clearly wasn't the sensationalist story of special treatment from the NYPD (nor an across-the-board condemnation for New York's finest) that Mr. Hayes was looking for. We could have told him that Captain Lewis had his soundbites ready about his arrest before the weekend began.

What strikes us as more interesting (and which the show completely glosses over,) is Captain Lewis' "special project" involving a Fracking protest upstate. Can we here more about that, please? Also, Captain Lewis gets all his information from the Internet and refuses to check other news sources? Is he part of Anonymous? These are the hard-hitting questions we want answered!

(And FYI: Don't think we didn't notice that you used the photos from Johnny Milano which first appeared on our site, MSNBC.)

Photo via Johnny Milano

Retired Philadelphia police Captain Ray Lewis, arrested yesterday after joining up with the Occupy Wall Street process, has quickly become one of the more iconic figures from the movement's two month's anniversary.

After we noted his arrest and put up several pictures of the event, we were contacted by everyone from The Associated Press to worried parents who thought they could find their son, who had been in the same paddy-wagon as Captain Lewis.

Here is what we know so far: Captain Ray Lewis has been released from custody. An unconfirmed Twitter account @CaptainRayLewis puts his release time at 9:00 p.m.

According to another source, Captain Lewis may not have ended up being charged with any assault.

From an email we received, "Regarding Ray Lewis":
When the legal aid (or whatever they're called) heard that ___ was ziptied next to Lewis, they asked ___'s mom for more info.

She and I knew that Lewis had been freed, or apparently so, much earlier .  The lawyer related that his people had heard press reports of Lewis' arrest all day but that his name never showed up on the arrest rosters they were given. This even as of around midnight.

I'm prepared to conclude that Lewis, unlike ____, was not charged. And of course he was not released, alone, from Pearl St in the middle of the night.

We called the Office of the Deputy Commissioner, Public Information to see if we could find an initial charge for Captain Ray Lewis.

Who is "Captain Lewis?" asked the confused DCPI spokesperson. We had to clarify that Captain Ray Lewis wasn't NYPD, and was also retired.  Then we were told, "We're not identifying individual charges from the arrests yesterday...there's just too many people." We asked if it would be possible to find out if Mr. Lewis had even been officially arrested, according to their records.We were put back on hold, and then then told that Captain Lewis had been arrested on three charges.

"One violation of local law, and two counts of disorderly conduct including disrupting traffic and refusing to move on."

So officially, the charges have been filed. We are still looking to get in touch with Captain Lewis, whose Twitter feed says he'll back back at #OWS today. If you have any information, please let us know!

(Photos via Johnny Milano)

Ray Lewis (Photo via Lauren Thorpe)

This amazing image comes to us via tipster Lauren Thorpe, who wrote in " I've been down at OWS all morning and am heading back down there again now," with an attachment of former Philadelphia police Captain Ray Lewis, who was arrested today in conjunction with the Occupy Wall Street protests. There is simply nothing more bizarre than looking at images of a man in police uniform arrested and handcuffed by people wearing lower-ranking NYPD garb.

Click through for larger image.

If that's not Pulitzer-worthy photography--capturing the true insanity of today--then we don't know our Pulitzers.

 

Captain Ray Lewis arrested (Photo via @AdamGabbatt)

Retired Philadelphia police captain Ray Lewis-- whom we profiled yesterday after a video emerged of him giving a speech down on Occupy Wall Street-- has been arrested, according the an official OWS press release.

From an email we received from OWS, titled "Thousands Occupy Wall Street; All Entry Points to NYSE Blockaded" (Emphasis their's):

At least 200 people have been arrested so far for peaceful assembly and nonviolent civil disobedience, including retired Philadelphia Police Captain Ray Lewis. "All the cops are just workers for the one percent, and they don't even realize they're being exploited," Mr. Lewis said. "As soon as I'm let out of jail, I'll be right back here and they'll have to arrest me again."

A NYPD spokesperson was unable  to confirm individual arrests, they did comment that "multiple arrests have been made in relation to the protests" and the charges were still pending.

Fox29 in Chicago was able to confirm the arrest, which happened earlier in the morning. A photo emerged on Twitter, via user @AdamGabbatt, showing Mr. Lewis in dress uniform, arguing with an officer. The New York Observer's Emily Witt saw him taken into custody on Nassau and Pine just after 9:00 a.m.

Former Philadelphia Police Captain Ray Lewis occupying Zuccotti Park last night. (Photo: YouTube)

A Philadelphia Police Department spokesperson confirmed to the Observer that Mr. Lewis was a captain prior to retiring in 2004. He was photographed at the protests yesterday afternoon as demonstrators ringed Zuccotti Park in the wake of their eviction.

In his late night interview with the livestreamers, Lewis said police in New York City should have dealt with Occupy Wall Street through negotiation rather than forcefully removing protesters from the park.

"You should, by law, only use force to protect someone's life or to protect them from being bodily injured OK? If you're not protecting somebody's life or protecting them from bodily injury, there's no need to use force. And the number one thing that they always have in their favor that they seldom use is negotiation--continue to talk, and talk and talk to people. You have nothing to lose by that," Mr Lewis said. "This bullrush--what happened last night is totally uncalled for when they did not use negotiation long enough."

Mayor Bloomberg has stated the raid was necessary because the protest encampment carried with it a risk of crime, fire and health hazards. Mr. Lewis called that rationale "a farce."

"They complained about the park being dirty. Here they are worrying about dirty parks when people are starving to death, where people are freezing, where people are sleeping in subways and they're concerned about a dirty park. That's obnoxious, it's arrogant, it's ignorant, it's disgusting," Mr. Lewis said.

Mr. Lewis said the police want to get rid of him, but he vowed to keep coming back to the protests.

"They're trying to get me arrested and I may disappear OK?" Mr. Lewis said. "As soon as I'm let out of jail, I'll be right back here and they'll have to arrest me again."

Mr. Lewis thinks some officers might appreciate his presence, but not top brass.

"I'm their worst enemy, especially with the white shirts, the bosses OK? Some of the fellow cops they might be thinking, you know, 'That guy, he's got a point,' but the bosses, i'm their number one enemy," Mr. Lewis said.

Mr. Lewis clearly doesn't think the NYPD likes him, but he told the protesters he doesn't think cops are their enemy.

"All the cops are, they're just workers for the one percent and they don't even realize they're being exploited," Mr. Lewis said.

Viewers who watched Mr. Lewis' interview told us he spoke on camera for more than 40 minutes. We'll try to get our hands on a full clip, but for now, you can watch an excerpt of Mr. Lewis' livestream appearance below.