• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

In after Baud. Damn.

The desire to stay informed is directly at odds with the need to not be constantly enraged.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

T R E 4 5 O N

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

Republicans don’t lie to be believed, they lie to be repeated.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Hell hath no fury like a farmer bankrupted.

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

They are not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. do not touch it.”

Text STOP to opt out of updates on war plans.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

Mobile Menu

  • Seattle Meet-up Post
  • 2025 Activism
  • Targeted Political Fundraising
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • COVID-19
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • 2025 Activism
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • Targeted Fundraising!
You are here: Home / Civil Rights / Criminal Justice / Shitty Cops / The Idea Was To Make Him Take a Vacation

The Idea Was To Make Him Take a Vacation

by John Cole|  October 19, 201110:31 am| 40 Comments

This post is in: Shitty Cops

FacebookTweetEmail

The mad pepper spray wielding cop has been “punished”:

A New York police commander who pepper-sprayed protesters during the opening days of the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations last month faces an internal disciplinary charge that could cost him 10 vacation days, the police said Tuesday.

The commander, Deputy Inspector Anthony Bologna, has been given a so-called command discipline, according to a law enforcement official. Officials said investigators found that the inspector ran afoul of Police Department rules for the use of the spray. The department’s patrol guide, its policy manual, says pepper spray should be used primarily to control a suspect who is resisting arrest, or for protection; it does allow for its use in “disorder control,” but only by officers with special training.

The Internal Affairs Bureau reviewed the episode and found that Inspector Bologna “used pepper spray outside departmental guidelines,” said Paul J. Browne, the Police Department’s chief spokesman. He declined to elaborate.

The inspector can accept the charge and plead guilty, or he can opt for a departmental trial. Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly is the ultimate arbiter of punishment in such matters and has wide leeway in his decisions.

Inspector Bologna’s actions on Sept. 24, when he sprayed several penned-in women, were captured on video and spread widely on the Internet. It became a defining moment in the protests.

This just strikes me as an absurd punishment- if someone is so stressed out as a cop they are macing people for no reason, using excessive force outside departmental guidelines, why take away their vacation days? Seems to me a more fitting punishment would be a mandatory month or two of vacation days, unpaid, and with some anger management courses to help work through some of the obvious issues.

Having said that, I’m mildly surprised they even admitted to the wrongdoing.

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « Six-Gun Showdown at the Hatin’ Brown Corral
Next Post: Legalize It »

Reader Interactions

40Comments

  1. 1.

    Rosalita

    October 19, 2011 at 10:36 am

    they even admitted to the wrongdoing.

    they had no choice, it was documented on video. no way to sweep it under the rug. it’s all PR. bastards.

  2. 2.

    phillip anderson

    October 19, 2011 at 10:38 am

    So I assume that Ray Kelly and the NYPD would now like to revise their previous statements describing Bologna’s use of pepper spray as “appropriate” right?

    Or do they often take disciplinary action against their employees for “appropriate” behavior?

  3. 3.

    markg

    October 19, 2011 at 10:39 am

    pretty mild punishment for a criminal assault

  4. 4.

    Joey Maloney

    October 19, 2011 at 10:39 am

    This just strikes me as an absurd punishment- if someone is so stressed out as a cop they are macing people for no reason, using excessive force outside departmental guidelines, why take away their vacation days?

    Did he look stressed to you in that video? To me he looked like he was enjoying the hell out of his workday.

  5. 5.

    MikeBoyScout

    October 19, 2011 at 10:41 am

    …faces an internal disciplinary charge that could cost him 10 vacation days, the police said …

    Then again it could cost him nothing. It would be wrong not to speculate.

  6. 6.

    Violet

    October 19, 2011 at 10:42 am

    The NYPD keep shooting themselves in their collective feet. Responses like this just keeps the story alive. It was police brutality before, now it’s corrupt police cronyism protecting their own instead of the citizens they should be protecting.

  7. 7.

    Han's Big Snark Solo

    October 19, 2011 at 10:44 am

    Forget about taking away his vacation days, they should take away his gun, tazer and any other form of weapon he carries.

    Put him behind a desk for the rest of his miserable life, he is, obviously, a danger to the community. Letting him walk around with a gun is like letting a child molester babysit your children.

  8. 8.

    cpinva

    October 19, 2011 at 10:44 am

    actually, he should be criminally indicted for assault & battery, under color of law. his “vacation” should be spent in a jail cell, for a year or two.

    odd, had i pepper-sprayed those women, we wouldn’t even be having this conversation, i’d be sitting in a cell in riker’s island, awaiting a hearing, and facing the prospect of jail time. a cop does it, and regardless of the fact that it’s clearly a criminal act, not even remotely justified by circumstances, and we’re discussing how long he should be on unpaid leave.

    had i pulled a comparable stunt like that in my job, i would (rightly so) be facing the prospect of a federal prison, regardless of my job status. in fact, because of my job status, i am expected to display the highest level of judgment. apparently, the nypd has no such expectations of those on its payroll.

  9. 9.

    Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen

    October 19, 2011 at 10:49 am

    I’ve heard there’s footage of a NY police officer cold-cocking a 20-something female protestor for the gross crime of standing there talking to him and some of his buddies.

    The liberal media has yet to pick up on this.

  10. 10.

    scav

    October 19, 2011 at 10:49 am

    FYI, links a bit wonky (split into one that works and one that doesn’t? something). Anyhoo, poor guy seems to think that his actions where justified

    “Deputy Inspector Bologna is disappointed at the results of the department investigation,” Inspector Richter said. “His actions prevented further injury and escalation of tumultuous conduct. To date, this conduct has not been portrayed in its true context.”

    Seems a bit unclear on this whole context of video and entirely unaware of the role the pepper-spraying got the media’s attention in a way that favored OWS. Bad case of terminally clueless. Wouldn’t I like to have a bug behind the closed doors of some of those internal NYPD meetings: I’m somehow guessing the public reproof will be a milquetoast as they can manage (thin blue line, ya know) but the off-the-record one will be a tad bit more medieval.

  11. 11.

    NCSteve

    October 19, 2011 at 10:51 am

    Dude, he didn’t do it because he was stressed out. He did it because he saw people who were not respectin’ his authoritay. Period. 90% of police misconduct is just as simple as Cartman banging on people’s shins saying “Respect mah authoritay!”

    Most cops with street experience come, not unreasonably, to associate displays of disrespect for their authority with personal danger. Some cops internalize that into a subconscious fear response to displays of disrespect for any authority. Bad Things often follow and those Bad Things frequently involve reflexive misuse of one of the pieces of gear on their belts.

  12. 12.

    Betsy

    October 19, 2011 at 11:03 am

    Actually the loss of ten days’ vacation is probably meant as a nominal penalty – about as minimal as possible. Cops may accumulate so much overtime that they have vacation or comp time they can’t use — like a lot of government employees.

    Typically if you’re a government employee and your excess vacation goes unused from year to year, it gets rolled into your retirement credits for years of government service at somewhat of a discount.

    So if his patterns are typical of government employees (an assumption), he’s probably losing nothing but 6 or 7 days’ worth of service credit toward his eventual pension.

  13. 13.

    cervantes

    October 19, 2011 at 11:07 am

    It seems to me a more fitting punishment would be criminal prosecution for assault and battery. That’s what would happen to anybody who did what he did, who didn’t happen to be a police officer.

  14. 14.

    singfoom

    October 19, 2011 at 11:10 am

    So, I was wrong, we don’t have a 2 tiered justice system. There’s 3 tiers. The first tier, for the rich, allow them to commit crime and use their wealth to hire top-flight attorneys to make sure they never actually pay for their crimes. There’s also an ultra-version of this tier for corporations so they can use our system to socialize their losses.

    The second tier is for police, who don’t get charged when they commit criminal acts that would get any normal citizen charged.

    And the last tier, the rest of us, subject to the whims and arbitrary nature of the police who “enforce” the law.

    Thanks NYPD, for clearing that up for me.

  15. 15.

    kc

    October 19, 2011 at 11:11 am

    if someone is so stressed out as a cop they are macing people for no reason, using excessive force outside departmental guidelines, why take away their vacation days? Seems to me a more fitting punishment would be a mandatory month or two of vacation days, unpaid, and with some anger management courses to help work through some of the obvious issues.

    It seems to me that a more fitting punishment would be criminal charges for assault and battery. You know, like what would any one of us would face if we walked up to a cop and maced him in the face.

  16. 16.

    Waldo

    October 19, 2011 at 11:12 am

    In a perfect world, the women in the video would each get a chance to blast Tony Baloney in the face with pepper spray. They would of course decline to stoop to such barbarism, thus compounding Inspector Baloney’s shame and public humiliation.

  17. 17.

    Cermet

    October 19, 2011 at 11:14 am

    @Betsy: Can’t speak for NYPD but for fed employes there is no such ability to save vacation to apply later; use it or lose it (after a set time period.) The days you speak of are long (and thankfully) gone. That is one good thing that was done (as a fed employee, I agree with this policy change 100%.)

  18. 18.

    MattF

    October 19, 2011 at 11:17 am

    It’s just an ‘enhancement’ of well-established crowd control techniques. And I’ve got this lawyer right here who says it’s policy and therefore no one may question it. Any questions?

  19. 19.

    cpinva

    October 19, 2011 at 11:17 am

    @scav: well yeah, that orange plastic fence could have been seriously injured by those women! think of the children!

  20. 20.

    maya

    October 19, 2011 at 11:17 am

    Hey! He could have gotten two Our Fathers and a Hail Mary from the NYPD chaplain, Capt Fr. O’Malley.

  21. 21.

    feebog

    October 19, 2011 at 11:19 am

    The punishment meted out here is absurdly light. I am a hearing officer and Arbitrator in the public sector, and I have heard a number of police disciplinary cases. I can tell you that many of these officers have received far more severe discipline for far less. This guy should have been subject to a discharge. At the very least a demotion is in order.

  22. 22.

    Rafer Janders

    October 19, 2011 at 11:33 am

    Seems to me a more fitting punishment would be a mandatory month or two of vacation days, unpaid, and with some anger management courses to help work through some of the obvious issues.

    Umm, seems to me a more fitting punishment would be arrest for assault, then a trial, and then, if convicted, a prison term commensurate with sentencing guidelines for similarly-situated offenses.

    Because I can assure you that if I were to walk up to a cop and assault them as Bologna assaulted those helpless women, the Manhattan DA wouldn’t recommend that my punishment would be me being forced to work through vacation.

  23. 23.

    cat

    October 19, 2011 at 11:33 am

    feebog:
    I have heard a number of police disciplinary cases. I can tell you that many of these officers have received far more severe discipline for far less.

    If you have time can you go into a bit more detail on how absurdly light 10 days vacation loss is?

    Are there lighter punishments? Whats the hardest punishment that doesn’t include firing or take years and years of appeals before its applied?

  24. 24.

    John X.

    October 19, 2011 at 11:34 am

    Cermet,

    Yeah. It’s always awesome when employers decide that they can unilaterally claw back benefits earned by employees. Maybe they can give them access to your bank account, so they can take back the pay you don’t spend, either.

    Benefits are earned, part of the compensation package. CEOs sure as hell understand this. Servants like yourself obviously do not.

  25. 25.

    Rafer Janders

    October 19, 2011 at 11:35 am

    This is an outrage. An absolute outrage. That a high-ranking NYPD officer can be witnessed on video by millions of people assaulting several non-violent New Yorkers in broad daylight, for no cause or provocation, and then be let off with less than a slap of a wrist, is a scandal and a crime. There is no justice.

  26. 26.

    tkogrumpy

    October 19, 2011 at 11:41 am

    Well, I guess the years have beaten down my expectations, but I was amazed and pleased that the powers backed down so quickly on such a high profile case and served up this officer some crow.Anyone who expects an officer of the law to face the same punishment as a civilian is seriously deluding themselves.

  27. 27.

    tkogrumpy

    October 19, 2011 at 11:45 am

    @Rafer Janders: Welcome to the world as it is, not as we would like it to be. Dick Cheney is still free,also too.

  28. 28.

    JR in WV

    October 19, 2011 at 12:01 pm

    Not having read all the comments, won’t this action by the NYPD provide valuable support to the civil suits filed by the victims against this sadistic monster?

    Shouldn’t there be suits filed by NYC residents to force the NYPD to treat this incident properly, as criminal police rage against helpless, restrained victims?

    Won’t this soon-to-be-ex police officer have all his possessions confiscated in order to make payment to his victims? Shouldn’t senior police officers who don’t recognize this as criminal behavior be relieved of their positions?

    Just askin’…

    JR

  29. 29.

    handsmile

    October 19, 2011 at 12:15 pm

    But wait, it gets better. This is a key paragraph in the article:

    The inspector can accept the charge and plead guilty, or he can opt for a departmental trial. Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly is the ultimate arbiter of punishment in such matters and has wide leeway in his decisions.

    Given the strong pushback to the IAB’s decision issued by the Captains Enforcement Association (Bologna’s police fraternal organization) as noted by scav above (#10), I expect Tony Baloney will appeal even this trivial punishment.

    Kelly will then delay appeal proceedings, no doubt citing the criminal or civil cases that may be filed by the victims of Bologna’s pepper-spray attack. In several months, the commissioner’s office will issue a exonerating statement, along the lines that while Bologna’s spontaneous action may have been regrettable, in the heat of “tumultuous conduct” by protesters, he was moved to protect his fellow officers.

    Another paragraph in the sordid chronicle of Ray Kelly’s tenure as NYPD commissioner can then be written.

  30. 30.

    DKF

    October 19, 2011 at 12:20 pm

    I think they should take away his employment altogether, to remind him that he, also, is one of the 99%.

  31. 31.

    Ella in New Mexico

    October 19, 2011 at 12:32 pm

    @Betsy:

    OMGOMGOMG!!!! No it doesn’t–that’s just another Federal Employee Urban Legend. The policy is called “Use or Lose”and if you accrue a certain amount you either find away to take those days or you lose them.

  32. 32.

    Chris from Arlington

    October 19, 2011 at 12:37 pm

    @Rosalita

    Jump a little lighter? Senorita come sit by my fire?

    Sorry, had to go there.

  33. 33.

    Tlazolteotl

    October 19, 2011 at 1:15 pm

    @handsmile: Oh, good, I’m glad I’m not the only one to see the humor in his name.

  34. 34.

    Tlazolteotl

    October 19, 2011 at 1:23 pm

    @Ella in New Mexico: You lose anything above 204 hours if you have more than that amount of annual leave accrued at the end of the calendar year – 204 hours is the maximum rollover. In some circumstances, lost leave can be reinstated, but it takes a lot of paperwork! Many federal employees, as a result, are basically gone for a good part of the month of December, as they take leave that they would otherwise lose.

    There is some difference between the CERS and FERS retirement systems for federal employees in how any accrued, unused annual leave is compensated for retirement. Sick leave may be accumulated without any ceiling, and unused sick leave is paid out at retirement. Sick leave, but not annual leave, may also be transferred to other employees. If someone is experiencing an extended illness, there will often be a call for employees in the agency who wish to, to donate leave to them.

  35. 35.

    Mark

    October 19, 2011 at 2:22 pm

    Based on this guy’s history I doubt that “if someone is so stressed out as a cop they are macing people for no reason” is the case. I think it is more likely that he is a sadistic sociopath who enjoys hurting people and no amount of “anger management” will help. He needs to retire to Florida.

  36. 36.

    Joel

    October 19, 2011 at 2:28 pm

    How about firing?

  37. 37.

    Rafer Janders

    October 19, 2011 at 2:40 pm

    @tkogrumpy:

    That’s what they’re counting on, our outrage fatigue. And I admit, my ability to get mad and stay mad was severely tested in the Bush years. But the second we stop getting outraged, they’ve won.

  38. 38.

    Rafer Janders

    October 19, 2011 at 2:44 pm

    @Mark:

    As has been pointed out before, if he was willing to assault several young white middle-class women, in broad daylight, on a city street, in the middle of a crowd, while knowingly being videotaped, what has he been doing over the years to young black and Hispanic men, at night, in back rooms or dark alleys, without anyone watching? It’s impossible to believe that this is his only instance of felonious assault on his fellow citizens. This is just the first time he got caught.

  39. 39.

    Nicole

    October 19, 2011 at 2:53 pm

    NYPD anecdote from years ago- I was rollerblading to work in the bike lane on 6th Avenue and was knocked right off my wheels by a squad car as I skated through an intersection. The two officers got out of the car, and tried to get me to say a van that had turned left behind me had struck me. “No, officers,” I said. “It was your squad car.”

    I didn’t file a report or anything, as, while I was badly bruised, I wasn’t seriously injured, but I’ve never forgotten them trying to get me to finger the blame on some poor innocent schmo.

    So the possible “punishment” levied on this cop doesn’t surprise me a bit.

  40. 40.

    Skippy the Wondermule

    October 19, 2011 at 8:00 pm

    The cop’s name is Anthony freaking Bologna?

    Look, I believe we should all take responsibility for our actions, but if my parents had named me Tony Baloney, I would be a serial killer by now.

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

Image by MomSense (5/21.25)

Recent Comments

  • eclare on Wednesday Evening Open Thread: An Exemplar for Our Global Embarrassment (May 21, 2025 @ 8:54pm)
  • Ruckus on Parsing the Pandemic Pause (May 21, 2025 @ 8:54pm)
  • Jay on Wednesday Evening Open Thread: An Exemplar for Our Global Embarrassment (May 21, 2025 @ 8:53pm)
  • Chetan Murthy on Wednesday Evening Open Thread: An Exemplar for Our Global Embarrassment (May 21, 2025 @ 8:53pm)
  • Omnes Omnibus on Wednesday Evening Open Thread: An Exemplar for Our Global Embarrassment (May 21, 2025 @ 8:52pm)

PA Supreme Court At Risk

Donate

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
War in Ukraine
Donate to Razom for Ukraine

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Meetups

Upcoming Ohio Meetup May 17
5/11 Post about the May 17 Ohio Meetup

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)
Fix Nyms with Apostrophes

Hands Off! – Denver, San Diego & Austin

Social Media

Balloon Juice
WaterGirl
TaMara
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
DougJ NYT Pitchbot
mistermix

Keeping Track

Legal Challenges (Lawfare)
Republicans Fleeing Town Halls (TPM)
21 Letters (to Borrow or Steal)
Search Donations from a Brand

PA Supreme Court At Risk

Donate

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2025 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!