INCOMING: Q&A With Ray Lewis, Retired Philadelphia Police Captain & OWS Protester

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Look for it Monday on a Phawker near you!

RELATED: A retired Philadelphia police captain arrested in uniform during Occupy Wall Street protests in New York City has received written warnings from police and union officials. Philadelphia police Commissioner Charles Ramsey sent a cease and desist letter to retired Capt. Raymond Lewis, saying the police department supports his First Amendment rights but “those rights do not extend to the improper and/or illegal use of the official uniform.” “It could give the mistaken opinion that somehow this is a statement being made by a member of the police department, and it’s not,” Ramsey said in telephone interview Thursday. “He has every right to protest. But wear something else.” MORE

RELATED: Retired Philly Police Captain Explains Why He’s Joined #OccupyWallStreet And Rank And File NYPD Should, Too

PREVIOUSLY: #OCCUPYWALLSTREET: Ex-Philly Police Captain Getting Arrested Outside NY Stock Exchange

PREVIOUSLY: The Dream Police

https://i0.wp.com/farm8.staticflickr.com/7006/6485529473_1ffd2515ee_m.jpg?w=790RELATED: When the LAPD finally began arresting those of us interlocked around the symbolic tent, we were all ordered by the LAPD to unlink from each other (in order to facilitate the arrests). Each seated, nonviolent protester beside me who refused to cooperate by unlinking his arms had the following done to him: an LAPD officer would forcibly extend the protestor’s legs, grab his left foot, twist it all the way around and then stomp his boot on the insole, pinning the protestor’s left foot to the pavement, twisted backwards. Then the LAPD officer would grab the protestor’s right foot and twist it all the way the other direction until the non-violent protestor, in incredible agony, would shriek in pain and unlink from his neighbor. It was horrible to watch, and apparently designed to terrorize the rest of us. At least I was sufficiently terrorized. I unlinked my arms voluntarily and informed the LAPD officers that I would go peacefully and cooperatively. I stood as instructed, and then I had my arms wrenched behind my back, and an officer hyperextended my wrists into my inner arms. It was super violent, it hurt really really bad, and he was doing it on purpose. When I involuntarily recoiled from the pain, the LAPD officer threw me face-first to the pavement. He had my hands behind my back, so I landed right on my face. The officer dropped with his knee on my back and ground my face into the pavement. It really, really hurt and my face started bleeding and I was very scared. I begged for mercy and I promised that I was honestly not resisting and would not resist. My hands were then zipcuffed very tightly behind my back, where they turned blue. I am now suffering nerve damage in my right thumb and palm. I was put on a paddywagon with other nonviolent protestors and taken to a parking garage in Parker Center. They forced us to kneel (and sit–SEE UPDATE) on the hard pavement of that parking garage for seven straight hours with our hands still tightly zipcuffed behind our backs. Some began to pass out. One man rolled to the ground and vomited for a long, long time before falling unconscious. The LAPD officers watched and did nothing. MORE

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