The cops and union leaders who packed a courtroom on Thursday evening were livid but not surprised by the Manhattan District Attorney’s office decision to charge a Bronx man with misdemeanor obstructing government administration and a harassment violation in connection to a snowball fight that targeted police officers in Washington Square Park on Monday afternoon.
Gusmane Coulibaly, 27, of Anderson Ave. in the Highbridge section, was taken into custody by detectives from the New York Police Department warrant squad and booked at the 6th Precinct where he was charged with assaulting a police officer after he was identified as one of the four suspects who were caught on camera firing snowballs and chunks of ice at cops starting at 4:20 p.m. after the blizzard ended on Feb. 23.
Goulibaly was arraigned in Manhattan Criminal Court on the reduced charges after the DA’s office reviewed all of the evidence, including police body-worn camera footage, that showed the defendant throwing a snowball that appears to hit one of the responding officers, on the left side of his face near his eye.
Three other individuals are also depicted throwing snowballs that struck the officer and other cops during the near riot that followed. The officer suffered redness, tenderness, and pain in the eye, as well as pain in his head and neck. EMS transported him and another officer to Northwell Greenwich Village Hospital in stable condition.
Goulibaly was arrested and charged by the NYPD with assault on a police officer, obstructing governmental administration in the second degree, and disorderly conduct. The DA’s office pursued the reduced charges after prosecutors determined they would be unable to prove that the officer suffered any physical injury that was caused directly by Goulibaly’s conduct in Washington Square Park, although they are still investigating. Prosecutors noted that the defendant had been arrested in the Bronx two weeks earlier for an attempted robbery in the transit system before requesting supervised release, which was granted by the judge.
After the Bronx man walked out of court, Police Benevolent Association President Patrick Hendry blasted the decision to reduce the charges. Mayor Zohran Mamdani stated that criminal charges should not be pursued, saying the incident “looked like kids at a snowball fight,” on Tuesday night.
“You know what we saw in this courtroom? We saw a 27-year-old adult, so this notion that this was a playful snowball fight, obviously, is not true. This was a grown adult that was here,” Hendry fumed. “This was no few kids getting together for a snowball fight. This was an attack on the uniform that these police officers wear so proudly every day.”
Hendry claimed that Coulibaly and the three other suspects who remain at large had packed rocks into the snowballs before firing them at the cops. Coulibaly’s defense attorney George Vomvolakis rejected that premise, telling reporters the video evidence does not show a criminal attack.
“We’ve all seen attacks; we’re all New Yorkers. It just didn’t look like an attack to me,” Vomvolakis said. “Did it go a little past jokes and fun? Was it possibly a little disrespectful to the police? Yes.”
Gov. Kathy Hochul sided with the NYPD and the PBA.
“Our police officers put themselves in harm’s way every single day, and there is no circumstance where it’s okay to throw anything at a police officer.”
The Mayor reiterated his stance on Wednesday.
“I’ve said that what I saw was a snowball fight,” he said. “It should be treated accordingly. It was one that got out of hand. But that’s what it was.”
Mamdani traveled to Washington, D.C. on Thursday for an Oval Office meeting with President Trump, where they discussed building affordable housing above Sunnyside Yard. His spokesperson, Dora Pekec, released a statement after Goulibaly was arrested.
“As the mayor has said, police officers deserve to be treated with respect,” she said. “The videos he saw showed a snowball fight that got out of hand. He does not believe this situation rises to the level of criminal charges.”
Hendry said it was a horrible message coming from the Mayor’s office.
“You’re putting the target on these police officers’ backs, and that’s what they’re doing,” he said. “We are thankful for the many elected leaders and New Yorkers who supported these police officers. We thank the elected officials who have stood up and said ’this is wrong, this is an attack on our police officers.’”
