Hasidic Man Killed in Police Shooting in New York

September 2, 1999

Source: The Jerusalem Post

On September 2, 1999, The Jerusalem Post reported that Gideon Busch, a 31-year-old Hasidic man who lived in Borough Park, Brooklyn and was known to be mentally ill, was shot 12 times and killed by four police officers on Monday, August 30th after Busch attacked the officers with a hammer and refused to be subdued with pepper spray. When New York City officials were quick to defend the actions of the police in this situation, "other ethnic groups intimated that police were more concerned about having shot a Jew than they had been when police shot blacks and Hispanics." When a Spanish-language news broadcast asked city officials why it did not give a comparable response when a Hispanic was shot, the mayor and police commissioner contended that they followed procedure for dealing with the deranged. Despite a Jewish protest on Monday night, Noach Dear, a city councilman representing Borough Park, expressed the Jewish community's respect for the police. Al Sharpton, a black community activist who lead protests in the controversial murder of Amadou Diallo by police last winter, went to Borough Park, but was turned away when residents shouted that he was an anti-Semite.