NYPD lieutenant apologizes for kneeling alongside protesters in response to ‘NYPD, take a knee’ chant

“I thought maybe that one protester/rioters who saw it would later think twice about fighting or hurting a cop,” Cattani’s email read. “I was wrong. At least that [sic] what I told myself when we made that bad decision. I know that it was wrong and something I will be shamed and humiliated about for the rest of my life.”

He said, “The conditions prior to the decision to take a knee were very difficult as we were put center stage with the entire crowd chanting. I know I made the wrong decision. We didn’t know how the protesters would have reacted if we didn’t and were attempting to reduce any extra violence.”

Cattani and three other officers can be seen on video as protesters chanted, “NYPD, take a knee,” kneeling in front of them during a protest on May 31.

“I spent the first part of my career thriving to build a reputation of a good cop,” Cattani said. “I threw that all in the garbage in Sunday.”

Cattani added that part of him has a difficult time imagining how he could return to work after “shaming” his uniform, but he ultimately decided that quitting would be taking the “easy way out.”

Police officers across the country were shown kneeling alongside protesters over the past couple of weeks in what is generally perceived as an homage to former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who gained national attention for kneeling during the national anthem in 2017 in a move he said was a protest against police brutality.

Some protesters have taken issue with the police kneeling, referring to it as a public relations stunt.

“I need cops and politicians and white people more broadly to stop kneeling,” author Roxane Gay wrote on Twitter. “We don’t need you to kneel. We need you to stand up for real, radical, sustained change.”