A Victory for Boobi...err... Women's Rights!

[Headache in a Suitcase]

NEW YORK (AP) -- A woman arrested for exposing her breasts has accepted a $29,000 settlement from the city, her lawyer said.

Jill Coccaro, 27, was arrested on a topless stroll two years ago, despite a 1992 state appeals court ruling that concluded women should have the same right as men to take off their shirts.

Coccaro, who now goes by the name Phoenix Feeley, remained in custody for 12 hours before she was told prosecutors were not going to pursue charges.

Her attorney, Jeffrey Rothman, told the Daily News that his client won the civil rights settlement from the city, which did not admit or deny wrongdoing.

"We hope the police learn a lesson and respect the rights of women to go topless," Rothman said.

Feeley told the New York Post that she was not treated well after her August 4, 2005, arrest in Manhattan's Lower East Side section. She claimed in an October lawsuit that a police officer yanked her out of a patrol car by her hair and police took her to a hospital for a psychiatric evaluation.

She told the newspaper she had gone bare-breasted after running the 2004 city marathon without police bothering her.

"I've always just felt that was something natural," Feeley said of going topless. "I've kind of always done it out of practicality."

 

[BVS]

$14, 500 per breast, pretty nice but Halle Barry got $250,000 per to expose herself...

 

[LemonMelon]

There is hope for America after all.

 

[Dusty Bottoms]

this thread is useless without pics

 

[Lancemc]

You've got to be kidding. How ridiculous.

 

[redhotswami]

Phoenix Feeley??

 

[Dusty Bottoms]

Phoenix Feeley??

sounds like a, uh, interesting person

When word came that there was a protest in Central Park on Sunday afternoon to be carried out exclusively by naked girls, The Transom sprung into action, camera in hand.

But on arrival, there was only a huddle of shirtless old men. Some were on bicycles. Others merely stood around writing slogans on each other's backs... with permanent marker.
dudes

The demonstration, one of them explained, was being held in the name of a woman who had taken "her clothes off in protest of the Iraqi war and walked naked in the fountain." She'd been arrested, despite statute 245.01 of the penal code, which gives women the right to go topless, on account of equal rights and all. "It's pretty much a political thing," the man explained. "I'm a troublemaker."

The Transom's eyes had strayed by then, however. There were six boobs in the midst of the sausage fest.

Two of them belonged to Phoenix Feeley, a young 2k5 hippie with American flag shorts on and needles through her nipples. She'd also been arrested for exposing her chest, in a separate incident, and as far as she knew, that was the inspiration for the afternoon's protest. Phoenix wore rollerblades. She laughed sweetly as she explained the various slogans on her chest: "No War," for obvious reasons, and "I Am Art," for quite separate ones. "I think they're beautiful, don't you?" she said, looking over at the shirtless men nearby. "It is a man's right to be topless—topfree—and nobody stops him.... We're here, and we're gonna show that we can be topfree—that we can be on our bikes or on our blades and be part of traffic."
lady!

Phoenix's friend Dana, meanwhile, pictured below with her daughter, spoke to reporters and friends as the group prepared for its march around the park. "You can totally tell she was nursed as a child," Phoenix exclaimed as Dana's little girl bounded forth for a hug with arms akimbo.

"Leave people alone, you know? If we can do it, why can't they?" said one male bystander, on break from his job at a nearby bistro. "More fun for me!"

This kind of attitude seemed uncommon, weirdly enough, and to everyone's surprise, reporters from the Daily News appeared to be the only ones taking any pictures.

"I remember when I was in college, and it clearly mattered more to the people with the binoculars than it did it to me," said Chanita Baumhaft, a young fiction writer who sat happily topless on the curb with her boyfriend. "The gawker situation is not too bad."
nice folks

Indeed, the protestors didn't win an audience until they started moving a little before 3 p.m. "Freeeeedddooooooom!" Phoenix cried, touching off on her rollerblades and overpowering even the massive Dominican Day Parade that was roaring wildly on Central Park West. The women moved swiftly, some of them traveling on their own wheels and others bouncing humbly in rental rickshaws. The men kept up, pedaling furiously with their helmets on and their shirts still absent.

After a few minutes, Phoenix announced that the people who could keep up would go ahead, and the rest would meet back at Columbus Circle after the journey had been made.

"This is amazing," said one teenage boy by the side of the road, as Dana bought an ice cream sandwich for her daughter. "This is better than the internet."
leering!

A pair of fully-clothed Texan women riding by in a tour buggy, however, did not find the display so amusing. "We don't have these in Texas, these naked women," one of them said. "I was like, ‘holy shit!' I was thinking that it's illegal!"

Apparently the police thought so too. As we made our way back to 67th and Central Park West to wait for the bikers to make their loop, an officer rolled by in a cruiser and said that he was looking for a protest. Needless to say, The Transom did not snitch.
The rain started to fall just as the girls rolled into Columbus Circle a half hour later, the ink on Phoenix's body starting to run a little, her nipple rings glistening. The protest dispersed as the downpour grew thicker, and before long, naked time was over. It was the best day. — Leon Neyfakh

http://www.observer.com/node/32321

maybe the psychiatric evaluation wasn't such a bad idea

 

[LikeNoOneBefore]

Phoenix Feeley??

I'm sorry, but that sounds like a hooker name.




This story is ridiculous. Woooow. All I can ask is...WHY!?!?!

 

[deep]

this thread is useless without pics

 

[redhotswami]

who's the guy?

 

[elevated_u2_fan]

who's the guy?

which one?

OOOOH SNAP!

 

[AngelK]

Oh, so a woman can walk around topless and everyone gives it a thumbs up, but she can't breast feed her hungry child in public????

How pathetic, not say very hypocritical too!!!!

 

[Dusty Bottoms]

topless = sexy
body fluids oozing out of the body = not so sexy

 

[redhotswami]

topless = sexy
body fluids oozing out of the body = not so sexy

i don't think that is a fair way of looking at it. what's so wrong with feeding a child? you can't even see the fluids you're so disgusted with.

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

yyyea she should probably put her shirt on

 

[Zoots]

 

[BoMac]

i don't think that is a fair way of looking at it. what's so wrong with feeding a child? you can't even see the fluids you're so disgusted with.

There's nothing wrong with it but it can be shocking, especially if you're not expecting it.

About 7 years ago I was working as a teller at a bank. A woman and her baby come to my counter and I ask her what she would like.

Woman: I'd like to withdraw $200 please.

Ray(me): Certainly.

So I look down to grab a withdrawal slip and when I look up there she is, breast exposed feeding her baby. It was so shocking. My face propbably turned beet red because my co-workers were laughing.

Ray: H-h-h-here, um, you go. Um, er, please sign your, um, name, there.

Woman(without batting an eyelash): Thanks.

She signs the withdrawal slip and then is on her merry way.

I've never been so surprised to see a breast in my life!

 

[Lancemc]

I'm still trying to figure out since when it was OK for women to walk around topless?

 

[BoMac]

I'm still trying to figure out since when it was OK for women to walk around topless?

For anyone interested Google Gwen Jacob. She's a Canadian woman from Guelph, Ontario who, in 1996, was thrown in jail for walking topless and subsequently sued and won the right for woman to walk around topless.

 

[Lancemc]

Crazy. That's news to me.

 

[corianderstem]

She was on Geraldo last night. She looks better with her shirt on.

 

[LemonMelon]

Pfft...why are they never a looker?

 

[corianderstem]

Oh, I dunno. Take away her hair crimper, and she'd be okay. Like I said, she looked better on TV last night. The Lady Godiva thing isn't working for her.

 

[Lancemc]

I think the whole topless thing isn't working for her.

 

[corianderstem]

I think her lawyer dude might be growing out his hair in solidarity.

 

[snowbunny00774]

For anyone interested Google Gwen Jacob. She's a Canadian woman from Guelph, Ontario who, in 1996, was thrown in jail for walking topless and subsequently sued and won the right for woman to walk around topless.

Women rarely do, but thanks to her for over 10 yrs we've had the choice if we felt like it

 

[corianderstem]

Yeah. It's pretty ridiculous to think that a woman is going to run around with her top off just because it's unfair that a guy can but we can't.

But on the other hand, it would be nice to know that should I end up topless in public (HA!), I wouldn't be arrested for it.

 

[LemonMelon]

I want to go topless and be able to sue somebody.

This is INJUSTICE!!

 

[Berto87]

All that is left now to do is champion the right to go pantless