It’s no secret that the New York Police Department is no fan of Occupy Wall Street. They’ve indulged in everything from petty harassment (see: NYPD and Fire Department raid Occupy Wall Street, confiscate generators) to urban assault (see: More trouble for pepper-spray cop Anthony Bologna?)

It’s even reached the point that crime in the rest of the city is rising, but that doesn’t seem to bother them (see: NYPD so busy arresting Occupy Wall Street protesters they have no time for actual criminals.)

But this report from Harry Siegel (a former editor at the New York Sun, New York Press and Politico) is very, very disturbing. He says there’s a growing problem at Zuccotti park in Manhattan as the number of “bad elements” and freeloaders has “exploded” in the past week. And he says the NYPD is encouraging this trend:

…The NYPD seems to have crossed a line in recent days, as the park has taken on a darker tone with unsteady and unstable types suddenly seeming to emerge from the woodwork. Two different drunks I spoke with last week told me they’d been encouraged to “take it to Zuccotti” by officers who’d found them drinking in other parks, and members of the community affairs working group related several similar stories they’d heard while talking with intoxicated or aggressive new arrivals. The NYPD’s press office declined to comment on the record about any such policy, but it seems like a logical tactic from a Bloomberg administration that has done its best to make things difficult for the occupation — a way of using its openness against it.

This has all the hallmarks of an organized campaign, and that would mean orders coming down from the top. Cops don’t all start suddenly using the same wording by accident:

“He’s got a right to express himself, you’ve got a right to express yourself,” I heard three cops repeat in recent days, using nearly identical language, when asked to intervene with troublemakers inside the park, including a clearly disturbed man screaming and singing wildly at 3 a.m. for the second straight night. “The first time I’ve heard cops mention our First Amendment rights,” cracked one occupier after hearing a lieutenant read off of that apparent script.

Instead of working to calm things down, the police are ramping things up: The head of the police sergeants’ union even went so far as to issue threats that if any of their officers got injured, they would sue the protester involved – as well as any organizations that lent “material support” to the occupation. Nice: “You busted my knuckles with your jaw, so I’m suing!”

“What I’d like to make clear is people can protest, that’s their right, it’s done every day of the week (in New York City),” Mullins said, but added, “We’re going to hold those who allow this to fester accountable too.”

But who is it who’s really allowing things to fester? The occupiers, who are conducting a fascinating experiment in democracy (under difficult circumstances), or the police who seem hell-bent on sewing discord and blowing it up?

It doesn’t have to be this way. In Albany, NY, just up the Hudson River, the DA and the Police stood up to the governor, in effect saying “The only way this is going to be dangerous and disruptive is if we send in the police to shut this down” (see: Police defy order from Mayor, NY Gov, to shut down and arrest Occupy Albany).

And in Orange County, the City Council has voted unanimously that tents are a protected part of the occupiers’ right to free speech and free assembly. (See: Irvine City Council says Occupy Orange County tents are free speech. Unanimously)

But instead, the NYPD seems to be acting like the private security force for New York’s big banks. As activist Daniel Zetah told Siegel, “The police are saying ‘it’s a free for all at Zuccotti so [drunks] can go there’.”

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