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NEW YORK, June 4 (UPI) _ A Brooklyn federal judge will instruct the jury to start
deliberations on the fate of four New York City police officers charged in the brutalization
of Haitian immigrant Abner Louima.
The central defendant in the case, Officer
Justin Volpe, dropped out of the case last week after pleading guilty to shoving
a stick up Louima's rectum.
Lawyers for the remaining defendants say
Volpe acted alone their clients did nothing wrong.
A federal prosecutor Thursday accused one
of the defense lawyers of "playing the race card" by implying his client
would not have beat Louima and used racial epithets because his fiance is black.
Chief Assistant U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch
said during closing arguments that Officer Thomas Wiese was trying to hide behind
the color of his girlfriend's skin.
Lynch said, "Don't let these defendants
push us back to the days when police officers could beat people with impunity and
then lie to cover it up."
Officer Charles Schwarz, accused of holding
Louima in a police station men's room while Volpe sexually tortured him with a stick,
says Volpe acted alone. The lawyer says Louima lied and said a second officer was
involved because he was ashamed of being sodomized by a single man.
The lawyer for Wiese, accused of beating
Louima in the back of his patrol car, argued the assault in the cruiser never took
place.
The lawyer suggested Louima made up the
attack to get revenge on as many officers as he could for the men's room sex attack.
The lawyer for Officer Thomas Bruder argued
his client was not anywhere near Louima during the alleged patrol-car beatings or
the police station torture.
The lawyer for Sgt. Michael Bellomo, charged
with covering up parts of the incident, says his client was lied to by other officers
and made some honest record-keeping mistakes.
Louima's sexual torture in August 1997,
one of a long string of ugly incidents involving the New York City Police Department
and members of minority communities, sparked outrage and protests throughout the
city.
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