er 22, 1994, Anthony Baez, age twenty-nine, was playing football with family members at the Baez home in the Bronx. When the ball hit a parked police car more than once, one of the officers in the car, Francis X. Livoti, reportedly became angry and arrested Anthony's brother, David Baez, for disorderly conduct. When Anthony Baez told Livoti to calm down (Livoti later claimed Anthony pushed him), Livoti allegedly used a chokehold, resulting in Baez's death. Livoti reportedly had been the subject of at least eleven brutality complaints over an eleven-year period. He had been in the force's monitoring program because of these complaints, but then was removed from the program. A PBA lawyer said of Livoti, he is "what you want more of in the Police Department: an honest, dedicated, decent young man" (Human Rights Watch 2). The shooting of William Whitfield on December 25, 1997 by Officer Michael J. Davitt uncovered the disturbing fact that an officers' records on shooting incidents had not previously been tracked or subject to review. Officer Davitt reportedly shot and killed Whitfield, who was unarmed. Officers were responding to a report of shots being fired when Whitfield, who reportedly was uninvolved in the incident to which the officers were responding, did not obey the officers' orders to stop and entered a store. Officer Davitt claims he believed the keys or hat Whitfield was holding were a gun and shot him. After the incident, it was discovered that Davitt had been involved in more shootings than any other officer on the city's force, shooting nine times in fourteen years. Davitt reportedly had also been the subject of twelve unsubstantiated complaints (Human Rights Watch 4). People who admit that crime is decreasing because of these policies are only being self-defeating because if they admit that crime is down because of these policies, then they can use the same policies on the cops to improve police conduct. Yes, broken windows...
