Nicholas Scalzo: NYPD cop suspended after hitting 14-yr-old girl 11 TIMES while trying to break up fight
STATEN ISLAND, NEW YORK CITY: A viral video showing an NYPD cop hitting a 14-year-old girl in the head during an after-school brawl on Staten Island has resulted in his immediate suspension without pay, drawing a quick reprimand from Mayor Eric Adams on Wednesday, January 4. Adams reportedly said he was "not pleased with what [he] saw on the video."
The cop, identified as Nicholas Scalzo, and another officer attempted to break up a fight that started near Edwin Markham Middle School around 2.45 pm on January 3. Later, he could be seen on video punching a teenager. "I jumped in and the cops came and were supposed to be breaking it up, but the cops got into the fight," the girl, Kyonna Robinson, told The NY Post. "Then everyone was just in handcuffs and my sister [was] in handcuffs," she said, "and I went up to my sister and asked the cops, 'What are you doing?' and he pushed me and then I hit him two times and then he hit me 11 times," she said. "I thought they would break up the fight. I didn’t think they would get into the fight."
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According to the NYPD, the cops stepped in to break up a dispute between two females as they were stationed at a foot post near Willowbrook Road and Forest Avenue. The resulting brawl was captured on camera, with the now-suspended cop seen striking the girl repeatedly in the back of the head while other students unsuccessfully sought to pull the teenager away. "There was a fight between two girls. We tried to intervene and it looks like one of the girls tried to stop us from intervening," an NYPD spokesman said.
CW: Police violence
— Rafael Shimunov (@rafaelshimunov) January 4, 2023
This appears to be a teen being beaten by @NYCMayor’s NYPD around the block from IS 051 Edwin Markham middle school. pic.twitter.com/h092ZJgHyv
Video posted online shows a girl with long red braids, identified as Kyonna, being repeatedly struck by Scalzo. He punches the girl about 11 times as she backs away from him and other teens try to pull her away. She threw a few punches of her own before flailing her arms in an attempt to break away from the cops, the video shows. "He's hitting her? What the f***!" one girl off-camera screams.
The two girls, ages 12 and 14, were detained and then released without being charged while the investigation is ongoing, according to the police. "I got a knot on my head," Kyonna said. "I still have migraines. I can feel where the knot on my head is without touching it. "If you are going to have officers like police officers, you should know that they’re going to do the right thing, that they’re not going to beat up on a 14-year-old," she said.
She claimed that when the police arrived, her younger sister Kaila had been attempting to break up the fight in the schoolyard. "It’s upsetting," the girls’ mother, Taneesha Robinson, said Wednesday. "I mean, it’s really upsetting to see a man hit a woman, but even more so to see a grown man hitting a 14-year-old girl and then just even more upsetting when that grown man is a police officer who’s supposed to be out there protecting women and children. It’s shocking," she told. "You don’t expect that."
Scalzo, who has not been named publicly, was suspended for up to 30 days without pay following an investigation by the NYPD's Internal Affairs Bureau, according to police sources.
Although a police source claimed the 14-year-old hit the policeman first, but they both agreed that the preteen was subjected to excessive force.