Just in time for tourist season, Times Square CD sellers are back on the streets. After fatally shooting a CD peddler who fired at them last year, cops cracked down on the salesmen, issuing 45 "aggressive solicitation" tickets in the course of one week in January. But that's two months ago—a reader sent us these photographs from yesterday afternoon, noting there wasn't an officer in sight for blocks.
In the pictures, there are a few peddlers—the fake rapper selling "autographed" CDs variety—and the reader said, shortly after 4 p.m., there were about 15 guys were out on 7th Avenue between 47th and 49th Streets, "hustling tourists and kids out of 10 dollars." In one instance a seller just as good as grabbed the money out of a boy's hand after he said he didn't want to pay. "I thought it was free!" the boy protested, according to the reader. "Just give me 10 dollars and we'll leave you alone," said the CD salesman, backed by co-horts. In another instance, a man "walked closely behind a young couple for two blocks demanding they take the CD because it had their name on it." The reader said the closest police presence was three blocks away, near the TKTS booth at 45th Street and Broadway.
The December 10 shoot-out involved rapper Raymond "Ready" Martinez who fired at a cop, when questioned about conning tourists into buying his discs by scribbling their names onto discs and demanding 10 bucks. (Because he was holding his gun sideways it jammed.) Law enforcement tightened after the incident and vendors complained they were being "harassed by the police." The Post went so far as to suggest that, like selling books or art, peddling CDs is a right protected by the First Amendment.
