Thirty-two young people, including several high school students, who were arrested last month as they headed from the Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn to a friend’s wake in Coney Island are organizing to demand that the police treat minority residents – themselves included – with respect.

They say the police targeted them unfairly on May 21, held them for 13 hours without food or water, then booked them on trumped-up charges. Most of them were held for almost 36 hours before being released or posting bail. They missed their friend’s wake. Now they’re seeking some way to mourn with dignity, instead of from inside a jail cell.

The youths, with the backing of Bushwick community group Make the Road by Walking, started leafleting on Thursday outside the 83rd Precinct in Bushwick, calling for Police Commissioner Ray Kelly and Mayor Michael Bloomberg to respond to the incident. Oona Chatterjee, co-director of Make the Road by Walking, said the group would hand out fliers in front of the police station every weekday afternoon until the city responds. But Chatterjee said the leafleting is just the beginning. She said those who were arrested and their families and supporters are organized and committed to fighting for respectful law enforcement in their community.

“Young people from the neighborhood come into our office regularly with complaints about police harassment and mistreatment,” Chatterjee said. “And in the past few weeks ... those complaints have become more frequent.”

Those arrested came up with five demands in the days afterward: to have all charges dropped; to receive a public apology from the NYPD; to begin a dialogue with Bloomberg and Kelly about police misconduct and racial profiling; to have the police officers involved publicly identified, and removed; to receive help in creating a memorial to make up for the missed wake.

The group and their supporters are planning a town hall meeting June 5 at St. Barbara’s Roman Catholic Church for those concerned that police harassment of young people from the neighborhood reflects a policy – either official or unofficial – at the precinct and the department, and that it won’t be tolerated. [MORE]