POLICE STATE

Convention detention

A graduate student at Columbia University, Alex Pincus, 28, and a friend rode their bikes over to the Second Avenue Deli on Friday evening to buy dinner. As they were waiting, they saw that the block had filled with bicyclists. These, they later learned, were some of the 5000 people who had taken part in the Critical Mass ride, pedaling through Manhattan streets shouting anti-Bush slogans.
When Pincus and his pal, Isa Wipfli, 29, went to retrieve their own bikes, they found that police had cordoned off the block at both ends. Pincus approached a nearby officer. 'I said, 'Hi. We're just here buying dinner. We're not involved. How do we get out of here?' ' Pincus said the cop led them down the street and then called two other police officers over, and shouted, 'These guys!'
Pincus and Wipfli were immediately seized. "We tried to show them the bags of food and the receipt. We said, 'Look, it's still warm.' They wouldn't listen."
What Pincus was more worried about was his chronically ailing shoulder as cops pulled his arms back and placed him in plastic flex-cuffs. "I tried to tell them I can't put it in that position, that it will dislocate. Instead, they pulled my shoulder out of its socket. The pain was tremendous."