Protest Police Tactics

The Eastern Long Island Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and more than a dozen others representing the Huntington Crossway neighborhood in Bridgehampton, held a press conference Tuesday morning on the steps of Southampton Town Hall to criticize the methods used to arrest and prosecute street-level drug dealers.

Those who spoke repeatedly said they approved of the yearlong attempt by the Town Police Department's street-crime unit and other agencies to rid the neighborhood of drug dealers.

However, during the conference and in telephone interviews, the group had three complaints: that police strong-armed the families of suspected dealers, that prosecutors aimed for long prison terms and denied those arrested - some of whom were teenagers - any chance at rehabilitation, and that neither complaint would be the case in a white neighborhood.

"Terrorized"

"Children and adults are being terrorized in their homes. We object to these late night and predawn drug raids . . . so reminiscent of the Klan night riders," Lucius Ware, president of the local N.A.A.C.P., told reporters from three newspapers, a radio station, and two television stations.

He and others charged that the police and prosecutors had become overzealous recently. Henry Lee Hodge, who lives on the Sag Harbor Turnpike and is the youth director of the Bridgehampton Child Care Center, recalled that two years ago Capt. Anthony Tenaglia of the town force had attended a community meeting to answer complaints from residents about too few patrols.

This had been followed by a series of sweeps that has netted some 100 arrests in Southampton Town since October of 1996.

Early Morning Question

Now, residents want the early morning house raids to stop and police to limit their surveillance and arrests to the streets where dealers are known to hang out and where some have been videotaped selling to undercover officers, Mr. Hodge told The Star last week.

Captain Tenaglia, reached Tuesday afternoon, called the press conference a case of "grandstanding."

"If the intent is to air concerns and have them addressed, then they should have come first to this department. . . . Our only purpose is to rid neighborhoods, not just in Bridgehampton, but all over town, of drug dealers. We make no distinction as to skin color," he said.

In telephone interviews, residents said police had raided houses on Hampton Court, the Turnpike, and Huntington Crossway looking for suspects who live elsewhere.

Wrong Man

"These houses have small kids living there. What if someone makes a wrong move and someone gets shot? It could end up being a child," Mr. Hodge told The Star.

William Street, Dock White, Paulette Harding, Bridgette Myrick, and other residents said at the conference that their children had been awakened during the raids by police officers shining flashlights into their bedrooms. They said the children remained frightened that police might come back.

Evelyn Harris said police came looking one morning for her son, who does not live with her, but instead took her boyfriend, Alejandor Diaz, away in handcuffs. He was released hours later, without an apology she said, after fingerprints, questioning, and a lineup revealed they had the wrong man.

Morning's Defended

"We did not violate anyone's rights," asserted Captain Tenaglia. He and Lieut. Tom Talmage, a spokesman for the state police, said that early morning arrests were safest for everyone involved, that suspects and their families were "asleep, quiet, and there's less of chance of resistance," as the captain put it.

William (Curly) Street, who has relatives who have appeared in the police news from time to time, said his house had been the target of predawn visits four times. Once, police came looking for and found his brother, but the other times left empty-handed.

"They were looking for my nephew. He visits his mother here sometimes, but he hasn't lived here in 10 years or more," said Mr. Street. He said that he had asked to see a warrant each time and that each time police refused.

Out In Boxers

On the third occasion, he claimed, a state trooper put a gun to his face when he asked for a warrant. "I was so nervous looking down the barrel of that gun, I was shaking," he said. The fourth time, he found the telephone wires outside his house "fresh cut" after police left.

"There was 15 or 20 cops surrounding my house, banging on the windows and doors. I opened the door and said let me put some clothes on, but they said no. They made me stand out in front in my boxers," he said.

Mr. Street also said police used abusive and obscene language. "I don't have any problem with them arresting people who went the wrong way. . . . Show me a warrant and I'll cooperate. The police act any way they want but I'm not going for it anymore," he said.

No Warrants

"There's no Al Capone living in this neighborhood. You don't need 20 cops to arrest one person. And, if they've been investigating so much, why don't they know these addresses aren't any good?" Mr. Hodge said.

"I understand they're doing their jobs but they could go about it in other ways. There's no need to be ransacking people's houses and scaring small children," he added.

Police do not carry arrest warrants when they are looking for suspects, although arrest warrants allow them to search a given premises, said Captain Tenaglia. He added that none of the raids mentioned had involved search warrants. If they had, police would have been required to show them.

Captain Tenaglia and Lieut. Talmage said they had not heard any complaints from neighborhood residents before being questioned by The Star. Both agreed that the department uses the most recent address listed for a suspect in police and motor vehicle records, and that their officers follow the letter of the law when executing a warrant.

Absent from the press conference were those residents who asked police to clean up the neighborhood.

The Concerned Citizens of Huntington Crossway formed last year to address drugs in the neighborhood. Members "asked for the support of the police and community activists," said Joyce Crews, a member who is a secretary at the Bridgehampton School. Since then, she said, there has been measurable change for the better.

"It's Better"

"It used to be that we couldn't even go outside our front door without having to interact with this stuff. There's still some of it going on, but it's better and I appreciate it," she said.

Ms. Crews said she believed there were "good and bad" police, that any complaints against them should be brought to light, but that they generally were doing what needed to be done.

"The people whose houses are getting raided should clean their houses if they don't want the police there. I'm not saying my house is cleaner than anyone else's, but, if there's something in my house that shouldn't be, then the police are welcome," she said.

Poverty The Root

Those who spoke out against the raids acknowledged that police were not at the root of the problem. They say poverty is.

"These kids don't want to choose drug-dealing as a career," said Mr. Hodge, who called jobs, not prison, the answer. Sending someone to prison puts a financial burden on the entire community, added Mr. Ware.

"When these young men are taken away from the community, their families are then being supported by the general public. . . . Until we reach the time when we have recovering people in the community, rather than addicted people going to prison and addicted people returning to the community, rehabilitation is cheaper," he told The Star.

Mr. Ware said community leaders would open talks with police and intended as well to speak to the judges who approved the warrants.