Criticism of Giuliani and Police Mounts After Funeral Violence

By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD

A day after violence marred the funeral for the victim of a police shooting, criticism of Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and the city's Police Department intensified yesterday as the mayor vigorously defended himself and the police and denounced the protesters for what he called an "orchestrated attack."

At news conferences and in pulpits across the city, the mayor's political foes seized on the melee as further evidence of what they described as the mismanagement of a police department that they contended was losing the faith of New Yorkers, especially in minority areas, after a string of police-involved shootings of unarmed men.

Mr. Giuliani yesterday ardently dismissed his critics and praised the police for having handled the funeral crowds in "a professional and restrained way."

But for the first time, the mayor also voiced sympathy for the family of Patrick M. Dorismond, the 26-year-old black Haitian-American whose funeral on Saturday was marred by scuffles among mourners and police officers in which 23 officers and 4 civilians were hurt and 27 people were arrested.

Detective Anthony Vasquez, the undercover narcotics officer who fatally shot Mr. Dorismond during a confrontation outside a Midtown bar in Manhattan on March 16, sent a letter to the family on Saturday offering his condolences. Asked by reporters about Detective Vasquez's gesture, Mr. Giuliani said it was "an appropriate expression."

"I commend him for doing it," the mayor said after marching in the Greek Independence Day parade in Manhattan, in front of the New York police band. "He did it on the basis of a father losing a son, or a mother losing a son, and I think we all feel that. We all feel very, very bad whenever a situation occurs in which a parent loses a child."

But almost in the same breath, the mayor again cited reports that Mr. Dorismond had assaulted his girlfriend a week before the shooting, suggesting that his temperament might have led to his death. The police have said Mr. Dorismond angrily rebuffed an undercover officer's request for marijuana and was shot while struggling with Detective Vasquez. No weapon or drugs were found on Mr. Dorismond.

"There is evidence, again evidence -- not yet decided," Mr. Giuliani said, "that he engaged in an assault, that he engaged in the activity that caused the shooting and that he had up until a week or a week and half ago indicated a strong propensity for doing that, including punching his girlfriend in the face" as she held their 3-year-old child.

From City Hall Park to a small Baptist church in the Bronx to the evangelical church in Flatbush, Brooklyn, where Mr. Dorismond worshiped, anger over the the Police Department's actions at the funeral and Mr. Giuliani's response to the shooting remained strong yesterday.

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