A jury found a Bronx NYPD officer guilty on all counts in an illegal chokehold case on Thursday – over three years after the incident, according to the Bronx District Attorney’s Office.<\/p>\n
Omar Habib, 41, was taken to Rikers following Thursday’s outcome in court. He was the first officer charged in the Bronx under a city statute that was passed in the wake of the George Floyd case in 2020.<\/p>\n
The law, titled “Unlawful methods of restraint,” barred officers from using chokeholds or other forms of restraint that restrict the detainees’ ability to breathe.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors say Habib was found guilty of second-degree strangulation, third-degree assault and unlawful methods of restraint.<\/p>\n
According to officials, the crime unfolded when Habib, who was assigned to the 47th Precinct, responded to a call at a catering hall on Eastchester Road on July, 29, 2023. Here, he encountered an intoxicated, disorderly man who refused to be placed under arrest.<\/p>\n
According to court records, Habib placed the man in a chokehold that was tight enough to impede the man’s breathing and cause him to lose consciousness.<\/p>\n
Habib was indicted on Aug. 8, 2024. Jury selection in his case kicked off last month.<\/p>\n
Habib is due back in court on Sept. 10 for defense motions. His sentencing date has not been set as of Thursday evening.<\/p>\n
News 12 reached out to the NYPD about the status of Habib’s employment and is awaiting a response.<\/p>\n
Public police records say Habib, who started his career with the NYPD in 2007, has racked up a slew of complaints and allegations, excluding the chokehold case. These include physical force, abuse of authority and discourtesy.<\/p>\n
He has been named in six known lawsuits, which resulted in a total settlement amount of $854,000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A jury found a Bronx NYPD officer guilty on all counts in an illegal chokehold case on Thursday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":224753,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,9,24,63,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-320637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320637\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/224753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}