Saturday, April 6th, 2013 — Good Afternoon, Stay Safe

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NYPD Stop, ~~Question~~ and Frisk

Police officers pressured to conduct stop-and-frisks: Criminal justice professor

Professor Eli Silverman said the pressure grew significantly after the NYPD began using the COMPSTAT system to fight crime, according to his survey of more than 1,900 former cops.

By Robert Gearty — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The New York Daily News’

A criminal justice professor testified Friday about a study he conducted in 2012 in which retired cops said they felt pressured to conduct stop-and-frisks when they were on the job.

Eli Silverman said the pressure grew significantly after the NYPD began using the COMPSTAT system to fight crime, according to his survey of more than 1,900 former cops.

Silverman was testifying in a class-action lawsuit in Manhattan Federal Court that claims the NYPD’s controversial policy targets minorities for illegal stops.

Earlier, a lawyer said experts will testify that when they analyzed crime suspect data they found race as a predictor of who is stopped “virtually disappears.”

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NYPD Stop and Frisk Trial: Week Number Three Completed

By Dominic Carter — Friday, April 5th, 2013; 3:44 p.m. ‘The Huffington Post’ / New York, NY

Here at the trial, the week ended for the NYPD the same way it started, and that is on the defensive.

On Wednesday and Thursday the plaintiffs put an expert witness on the stand, Professor Jeffrey Fagan of Columbia University, who studied four million of the random NYPD stop and frisks of New York City residents. Fagan is the professor that concluded the stops were based on race and ultimately unconstitutional.

In a calm yet steady voice on the stand, almost like a professor in the classroom, one could argue Fagan, by the numbers, did damage to the legitimately of "stop and frisk."

The Professor testified the 250-form the police department uses to record such "stop and frisks," "is not doing its job because the form did not provide the specific reason for such stops." Days before the trial began, the Police Department issued a memo where cops will now have to give an explanation for such a stop on the form, and not just check a box.

Fagan's words behind that witness stand were alarming. His observation of the NYPD practice: For the exact same offense, there is a greater chance of being arrested if the person is Black or Hispanic. And a better chance of receiving a summons if the person is white.

Fagan went on: "For the exact same offense, Blacks are 31 percent more likely to be arrested than Whites."

When it comes to force by the NYPD.

Fagan found "stop and frisk" resulted in: "14 percent more force against Blacks than Whites by Police Officers. For Latinos there is 9 percent more NYPD force used against them than Whites."

From the police commissioner on down, the NYPD has argued "stop and frisk" saves lives, and keeps guns off the street, but Fagan testified that the NYPD only recovered: "one gun for every one-thousand stops."

Throughout the week, we also heard some additional secret recordings from whistle-blower officers. In fairness, the recordings could be seen from several possible perspectives. One, that NYPD bosses wanted to make sure police were doing their jobs and not just hanging out in police cars. Or stated another way, increased productivity.

I couldn't help but think about the backdrop to all of this which all stems from when New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani hired Bill Bratton from Boston as his police commissioner. The department put to work the "Broken Windows" theory. In other words, using crime statistics to be pro-active on fighting crime. The official word was Comstat, where commanders were yanked into One Police Plaza, and grilled on the numbers. If the brass didn't like what they had to say, off that commanding officer went to a punishing transfer or assignment. The past week in court, one police term for such an assignment was referred to via testimony as "the cemetery."

Now two decade later, I'm sitting in a federal courthouse for the last three weeks, and it's not pleasant listening to secret recordings of whistle-blowers where commanders are heard on tape, demanding numbers and results at all costs. It's scary to hear, because if police officers are pushed hard by their bosses, it can lead to questionable arrests at the very least.

Here's what also occurred this past week.

It started with longtime NYPD critic State Senator Eric Adams on the stand. Police Commissioner Ray Kelly denies it, but Adams, a retired police caption himself testified that the Police Commissioner told him in a meeting that he ordered his commanders to "target young black and Hispanic men to instill fear in them that any time they leave their homes they could be targeted by police. Just days later, Kelly appeared at Rev. Al Sharpton's annual conference and said about "stop and frisk:"

"I believe this tactic is a lifesaver.... "It is also lawful and constitutional."

Twenty-four hours later on Tuesday, Police Deputy Inspector Steven Mauriello was on the stand, and again there were secret recordings from whistle-blower officers (with damaging comments by Mauriello on them). He's the commanding officer of the 81 precinct in Brooklyn, and it was either Mauriello or one of his supervising officers caught on tape making highly questionable comments.

The Deputy Inspector said the comments were taken out of context, or that his Sergeant was talking about criminals and gang members in the recordings, not the overwhelming law abiding citizens of Bed-Stuy Brooklyn.

Some of the quotes attributed to Mauriello and company:

"If you get too big of a crowd there, they are going to get out of control and they are going to think they own the block," a speaker on one of the recordings said. "We own the block. They don't own the block. They might live there, but we own the block. We own the streets here."

Referring to a residential building in Brooklyn, 120 Chauncey where police said there had been shootings three days in a row... a "Sgt Stoops" (under the command of Mauriello) is recorded saying

"Anybody coming out of the building, give me a 250."

Which means based on the recording search everyone and then complete the necessary paperwork.

On the stand Deputy Inspector Mauriello admitted it was a poor choice of words.

But there was more.

"Bring in groups, herd them in here. Everybody goes tonight. Zero tolerance."

If a young person was seen with a bandana handkerchief sticking out of the pocket, cops were told to 250 them. Again police language for a stop and frisk.

I rode down in the elevator with Mauriello from the 15th floor. Other reporters managed to get into the elevator and all Mauriello would say was it was his honor to serve the people of Bedford Stuyvesant Brooklyn. You could cut the tension with a knife as Mauriello forced a smile. Then one of the reporters asked him what about those NY Mets Baseball team? Mauriello said they always break your heart and quickly left.

No one knows how all of this testimony is impacting Manhattan Federal Court Judge Shira Sheindlin. She has told all of the lawyers involved that she doesn't want this trial to go on for two months. She wants them to pick up the pace.

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Scaring Skells Straight, One Toss At a Time

Bloomberg Boasts NYPD Policies Bring Rate of Gun-Toting Teens to Decade Low

Mayor argues that the NYPD has to be proactive and the policies should not end

By C. Zawadi Morris and Will Yakowicz — Friday, April 5th, 2013 ‘The ParkSlopePatch.Com’

According to data from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the rate of teens carrying guns in New York City is now less than half of the nation as a whole, and the city’s Mayor is taking the credit.

During a press conference at the NYPD's 81st Precinct in Bedford Stuyvesant on Thursday, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said that since he’s been in office the NYPD policies enacted – including the controversial stop-and-frisk policy – have helped bring down the number of gun-toting teens to a decade-low, reported The New York Post.

According to CDC data, 2.3 percent of city students in grades 9 through 12 admitted in a 2011 survey to carrying a gun within the past 30 days. That was the lowest percentage of any major city, and well below the national average of 5.1 percent.

In 2009, which was the last time the survey was taken, the city’s rate was 3 percent. In 2001, before Bloomberg took office, the rate of students carrying a weapon in the past month was 3.6 percent.

Although critics aren’t convinced that stop-and-frisk is driving down the number of weapons on the street, Bloomberg argued that the NYPD has to remain proactive in order to protect and save lives. He also said that the policies should remain.

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Worth the frisk as gun teens plummet: mayor

By DAVID SEIFMAN — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The New York Post’

The percentage of New York City teens who admit to carrying a handgun has dropped to its lowest level in a decade, Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday at a press conference with relatives of murder victims.

The mayor pointed to new data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to hammer home his argument that NYPD strategies — including the controversial stop-and-frisk tactic — are working to drive down crime and shouldn’t be stopped.

“I don’t think, given the results, that you want to go and say, ‘Let’s take each one of these things, cancel it for a couple of years and see what happens,’ ” the mayor said at the 81st Precinct station house in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn.

CDC data showed that 2.3 percent of city students in grades 9 through 12 admitted in a 2011 survey to carrying a gun within the past 30 days.

That was the lowest percentage of any major city and well below the national average of 5.1 percent.

In 2009, the previous time the survey was taken, the city’s rate was 3 percent. In 2001, before Bloomberg took office, it was 3.6 percent.

The mayor boasted that the rate of teens carrying guns in the city was now less than half that of the nation as a whole.

Joining Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Ray Kelly at the event were the families of four victims killed by guns, including that of 15-year-old Larry Hill, who was shot twice in the back in East New York in 2004.

A clergyman who works on an NYPD task force to reduce crime defended stop-and-frisk as long as it’s conducted with professionalism and respect.

“I wish stop-and-frisk was here at the time the guy had the gun that was coming after little Larry,” said Bishop Gerald Seabrooks of the Rehoboth Cathedral in Ocean Hill, Brooklyn.

“I wish that officer would have stopped, frisked and taken that gun off of him. Then, guess what, [Larry would] be here today.”

Earlier, the father of another 15-year-old whose murder shocked the nation also endorsed frisks.

“At this point, I think I’m with whatever will make the situation better,” said Nathanial Pendleton, after he and his wife, Cleopatra, met with Bloomberg at City Hall.

“We just need the guns off the street. We just need guns out of the hands of people who are not supposed to have them.”

The Pendletons lost their daughter, Hadiya, to Chicago’s mean streets a week after she performed at President Obama’s inauguration in January.

Critics aren’t convinced that stop-and-frisk is driving down the number of street weapons.

“There’s no correlation, and it’s a stretch of the imagination to suggest otherwise,” said City Councilwoman Letitia James (D-Brooklyn).

Bloomberg argued that the NYPD has to be proactive to protect lives.

“Nobody likes to get stopped,” he said. “But you have to do something. If it’s a question of stopping and annoying you or saving your life, I know which one we’re going to do.”

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Hypocrite Bloomberg

Mike's Gun Exception

By Unnamed Author(s) — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The New York Post’

(Op-Ed / Commentary)

Mayor Bloomberg spends most weekends in Bermuda, where he owns a $10 million waterfront estate.

Besides the golf and the sunshine, there's another thing he probably likes about Bermuda: The island has extremely strict gun-control laws to the point where most police aren't armed.

But in just another example of protection for me but not for thee, The New York Times reports that Bloomberg obtained a special indult for his NYPD detail to carry weapons in Bermuda.

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Raymond Kelly Interviewed

The Political War on the NYPD

New York's top cop Ray Kelly on fighting crime and fighting off critics of a basic police tool: stopping suspicious characters and checking for weapons.

By JAMES FREEMAN — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The Wall Street Journal’ / New York, NY

These should be the glory days for Ray Kelly. His years as New York police commissioner—13 in all and the last 11 since 2002—have seen crime rates plunge, the murder rate hit a historic low, and several foiled terror plots since 9/11 but no successful attack. The last time the city felt this safe, the Dutch were raising cattle at the bottom of Manhattan.

So why are Mr. Kelly and his officers suddenly under ferocious political assault?

"The police department has sort of become a piñata in this mayoral race," he says with matter-of-fact candor on a recent visit to the Journal's offices. "Their goal is to see who can get as far to the left as possible because they see that as the key to winning the primary. A small number of people and groups control the Democratic primary."

The liberal candidates—there is no other kind in these parts—are whacking with particular gusto at a police tactic called "stop-and-frisk." The practice involves stopping people who behave suspiciously, questioning them and, if they appear to present a threat, frisking them to see if they're carrying a weapon. The accusation is that this age-old police tactic unfairly targets minorities.

Surveying the current Democratic candidates, Mr. Kelly explains their basic campaign strategy: "You suck up to a special-interest advocacy group." One such group is the Center for Constitutional Rights, which is suing the NYPD in federal court to stop stop-and-frisk.

An audiotape recently played at that federal trial featured police commanders who were secretly recorded by an officer who has complained of discrimination. When the complaining officer asks if he should stop "every black and Hispanic" in a particular minority neighborhood, one of the commanders rejects the idea and says that in that neighborhood, the suspects in a recent series of robberies and larcenies were "male blacks 14 to 20, 21." Elsewhere on the recording, the same commander says, "The point here is that 99% of the people in this community are great, hard-working people who deserve" a safe neighborhood. Another supervisor tells the subordinate not to accost people without cause but to question people who appear to be "doing something wrong."

In some local media outlets, the recording was presented as evidence of racial profiling. "They are hell-bent on finding anything they can wrong with the department," says Mr. Kelly of his press critics.

The profiling accusation is especially galling to the 71-year-old former Marine and Vietnam vet. "We have transformed this police department," Mr. Kelly says. "We've made major changes in the last decade. For instance, the police-officer rank is majority minority. Nobody knows that. You can't get that story out."

Another story that doesn't get out is the astonishing transformation of New York City over the past two decades. In 1990, there were 2,245 murders, a record. There was a sense of menace in every borough and on the subways. A 10-year-old girl was strangled to death. A 22-year-old tourist was killed defending his mother against a gang of muggers. Dozens of New Yorkers were killed by stray bullets.

Since that terrible year, the annual number of murders has fallen more than 80%, to 419 in 2012. If the 1990 murder level had been maintained for the past 23 years, the rough math suggests that perhaps 40,000 New Yorkers—most of them black and Hispanic—wouldn't be alive today.

The revolution in safer streets occurred even as the city was adding more than a million new residents—to 8.4 million today—since 1990. Completing this tale of rare government success, Mr. Kelly notes that the current police force of 35,000 has 6,000 fewer officers than when he became commissioner in 2002.

Mr. Kelly says that stop-and-frisk is a critical—and constitutional—part of this success. "We put our officers right in the middle of where the problems are, mostly minority areas," says the 43-year veteran of the NYPD. "You develop very quickly a sense of who's doing right and who's doing wrong—and who's carrying a gun."

What counts as suspicious? Mr. Kelly mentions "scouting out a car, or following people." Or several young men waiting outside a bodega near closing time, or standing in the shadows near an ATM.

As Mr. Kelly describes it, when a police officer observes such activity, he is allowed to approach people and "ask them the nature of their business, what they're doing." He says this is legal under New York law and in "virtually every other jurisdiction in America." If the officer then feels threatened, he is permitted to do a "limited pat down" of the potential suspect. And if the officer feels something that he believes is a weapon, he can conduct a "full search."

In trying to spot the troublemakers before shots are fired, are the police unfairly targeting minorities? The commissioner says the data suggest that blacks are "under-stopped significantly," while other ethnic groups are "over-stopped." He reports that 53% of stops involve African-Americans, though blacks commit more than 70% of crimes. Hispanics on the other hand make up 32% of stops but commit 26% of crimes.

The top cop adds that even if his department is taking heat from the left, police stops of suspicious characters are popular where likely crime victims live. After all, 96% of shooting victims and 90% of murder victims in New York City are black or Hispanic.

"I was in a black church this Sunday. Standing ovation," Mr. Kelly says. "They know they're being victimized. They know crime has gone down in the black communities and they are very much concerned about it going back up."

The court case has him concerned about the potential loss of a powerful deterrent. "If you don't run the risk of being stopped, you start carrying your gun, and you do things that people do with guns. And you see what you have in some other places in this country."

Could crime-riddled places like Chicago learn from New York's example? "People come here and look at what we're doing all the time, and we have manuals. I think the biggest difference is political support," Mr. Kelly says. He believes that the "steadfast" backing of Mayor Michael Bloomberg is the key ingredient in the department's success—and derives partly from the mayor's vast personal fortune. "If you are an ordinary politician and you're counting on campaign contributions, the pressures are different."

The mayor has joined Mr. Kelly in criticizing a recent proposal from Democratic mayoral front-runner Christine Quinn to create a new inspector general to oversee the NYPD. The department is already overseen by two independent city agencies, plus the five district attorneys and two U.S. attorneys based in New York City. Mr. Kelly views the additional layer of bureaucracy as "totally unworkable" and says he already runs an organization with more oversight "than any police department in America."

Meanwhile, the stop-and-frisk case continues in the federal district court of Judge Shira Scheindlin, while the Brennan Center at New York University and the New York Civil Liberties Union keep pressure on the mayoral candidates to turn left. "It's just a small group and they have intimidated these politicians to take this route. And also, in my view, the judge is very much in their corner and has been all along throughout her career," he says, again with calm if surprising candor. If police can't do stops, he says, "you'd need another 50,000 cops" to protect the city.

"I think one of the biggest scams in law enforcement is the monitor," Mr. Kelly says. The plaintiffs in the stop-and-frisk suit have demanded such an overseer to watch the police. Mr. Kelly describes how the practice has worked under an "extremely aggressive" U.S. Justice Department going "around to different cities," where "they'll find some sort of discriminatory pattern in their minds."

The feds threaten to sue the cities unless they agree to a civil-rights monitor, and most cities agree, to avoid the cost of litigation. "So it'll be a politically acceptable lawyer who will be put in there and will always find something wrong, because they get paid. A city like Detroit pays, I don't know, a couple million dollars a year, whatever, to this firm and guess what? Nothing is ever right, because if I find everything's right then I stop getting paid."

So apart from stop-and-frisk, what are the other secrets to anticrime success? He partly credits an increasing focus on youth gangs and the way they communicate. "There is a social media component, because these kids, these crews, are bragging and telegraphing what they're going to do in terms of who they're going to shoot, who they're going to kill. They go in front of the [intended victim's] house and they'll stand in front of it and get a picture. And they try to play a game with code. But we break the code."

If only terrorists were always dumb enough to leave Twitter clues. Mr. Kelly's tenure has also been marked by the lack of a successful terror attack. The NYPD's 1,000-strong counterterrorism force works closely with Washington, and Mr. Kelly is concerned about a possible lowering of the federal guard.

"If you look at the latest National Intelligence Estimate," he says, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Department of Defense "are sort of now downplaying the threat of terrorism. . . . They look back historically, 'Hey look how few really big events we've had.' Meantime, I see New York City differently. We've had 16 plots against the city."

One recent example: Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis, who "thought he was blowing up the Federal Reserve Bank" of New York as part of an FBI sting operation, the commissioner says. "He goes to the New York Stock Exchange, sees the police that we have there and he decides he can't do it. Too much security." So the suspect instead parked what he thought was a van full of explosives in front of the Fed and tried to detonate it from a distance with a cellphone.

"There are other investigations of young people like this that are ongoing right now," says Mr. Kelly. "We see ourselves as the number one target and we have this stream of young men who want to come here and kill us."

Media reports have suggested that his department unfairly monitors the Muslim community—the Associated Press ran a Pulitzer Prize-winning series on that score in 2011. Asked what he has changed about the NYPD's surveillance methods in the wake of those stories, Mr. Kelly says: "Nothing."

An old judicial consent decree, modified after 9/11, lays out exactly what the police are allowed to do in gathering public information that may help prevent terrorism, he says. The department follows these rules. Next question.

OK, here's one: Will Ray Kelly jump into the mayoral race and take on his critics? On the recent church visit where the crime-fighter was so warmly received, many of the congregants urged him to run. But Mr. Kelly notes that a certain woman named Veronica, his wife of 49 years, opposes the idea. Many New Yorkers are hoping she'll reconsider.

Mr. Freeman is assistant editor of the Journal's editorial page.

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NYPD Stats Show that Brooklyn is Still Bloodiest Borough

By Nicola Pring — Friday, April 5th, 2013; 4:07 p.m. ‘The New York Observer’ / New York, NY

Though Brooklyn may seem like a happy hipster haven populated by vintage clothing stores and indie music venues, the borough remains New York’s bloodiest.

According to an annual NYPD report released yesterday on the state of murder in New York City, 36 percent of the 419 homicides in the city in 2012 took place in Brooklyn, making it the bloodiest of the five boroughs.

Most of the 419 murders took place in north and east Brooklyn. Three eastern Brooklyn neighborhoods—East New York, Brownsville and East Flatbush—are typically considered the most dangerous areas in Brooklyn.

The number of Brooklyn victims declined slightly as compared to 2011, a year in which the borough saw 38 percent of murders. Queens, which saw 20 percent of murders in 2012 experienced a slight increase, as did Manhattan, which had 15 percent in 2012.

While Staten Island saw just two percent of murders last year, distribution can be correlated to population size. Brooklyn has the most residents of any borough (2.5 million) compared to just 470,000 in Staten Island.

The NYPD also reported that 42 percent of murders in New York were motivated by a dispute or revenge, and 57 percent were the result of gun violence. Thirty-seven percent of homicides took places between 11 p.m. and 5 a.m.

Race certainly played a role in the homicide rate. The NYPD notes that 60 percent of victims were black, though black New Yorkers make up 23 percent of the population. Of all victims, nearly 40 percent were black males aged 16 to 37, and 86 percent of those black males were aged 16 to 21 and were victims of gun violence.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg presented the NYPD’s data at a press conference yesterday. He spoke about reforming the controversial stop-and-frisk policy in New York, and remarked that teenagers in New York City are far less likely to carry handguns than teenagers in other big cities. Mr. Bloomberg called New York the safest big city in the country.

“It really is quite remarkable, the job that the NYPD and everyone else that works with them, from the public on up, is doing,” Mr. Bloomberg said.

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NYPD Homi Stats

http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/downloads/pdf/analysis_and_planning/murder_in_nyc_2012.pdf

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113th Precinct / PSA # 9 Baisley Park Houses

Drug Arrests At Queens Housing Development Spark Protest

By Carol D’Auria (CBS News - New York) — Saturday, April 6th, 2013; 9:25 a.m. EDT

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — Residents of the Jamaica section of Queens erupted in protest late Friday, after police arrested two men following an alleged drug deal.

As 1010 WINS’ Carol D’Auria reported, the residents complained that Raynard Fields, 27, and his brother, Corey Crichlow, 33, were victims of a campaign of harassment by the NYPD.

Police were in the parking lot of the public housing development, at Foch and Guy R. Brewer boulevards in Queens, when they allegedly saw a drug transaction go down in a car Friday evening. Chichlow, who was driving, was a known drug dealer who had done time in prison for drug possession, according to police.

Police said the suspect became violent and officers were shoved to the ground. Fields was arrested for attempting to defeat Chrichlow’s arrest, police said.

Soon after the arrests, police were surrounded by neighbors, some of whom were throwing bottles and rocks.

Some residents also marched to the 113th Precinct police station, at 167-02 Baisley Blvd., accusing police of harassing young black men in the public housing development and knocking over garbage cans as they stormed down the street, according to a New York Daily News report.

Witnesses claimed to the newspaper that the officers beat the suspect.

No one was arrested at the stationhouse, the newspaper reported.

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Three-hour standoff between cops in riot gear and Queens residents after drug bust

Shocked witnesses said police officers pounded on brothers Raynard Fields, 27, and Corey Crichlow, 33, outside the Baisley Park Houses during the 7:45 p.m. arrest on Foch Blvd.

By Joseph Stepansky AND Kerry Burke — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The New York Daily News’

A drug bust outside a Queens housing project erupted into a tense three-hour standoff Friday night as dozens of angry residents marched on the 113th Precinct and cops in riot gear stood guard over their stationhouse.

Shocked witnesses said police officers pounded on brothers Raynard Fields, 27, and Corey Crichlow, 33, outside the Baisley Park Houses during the 7:45 p.m. arrest on Foch Blvd.

“The cops came up to the car and dragged (Crichlow) out and started beating on him,” said witness Gary Frazier, 22. “When (Fields) tried to calm the situation down, they beat him down. Cops came from everywhere.”

About 50 incensed residents protested the arrest and what they call a pattern of brutality by the NYPD by marching down Guy R. Brewer Blvd. to the Baisley Blvd. stationhouse. They ran through the streets, knocking garbage cans over during their 6-block trek, witnesses said.

“I am sick of the 113th Precinct harassing the young black men in the Baisley projects,” said marcher Kathy Moore, 40.

Cops responded to the impromptu protest in riot helmets and batons, forcing protesters onto the sidewalk.

“They were wilding out here,” livery cab driver Danny McLennon, 42, said of the residents. “The cops shut down Guy Brewer Blvd. Not even the buses could get through.”

More cops in riot gear met protesters at the 113th Precinct, where Fields was being treated inside an ambulance parked next to the stationhouse. Sources said he suffered a deep gash to his face during the brawl. He was expected to be taken to a hospital, a relative said.

Police sources said officers spotted Crichlow with drugs, but he swallowed them as they approached. The officers were arresting Crichlow when Fields interjected and a fight broke out, sources said.

At least one officer was injured in the fight and was taken to an area hospital with neck and back injuries. Other cops had to evade a barrage of garbage and bottles that witnesses were throwing at them.

“(Residents) were throwing things from windows,” a police source said.

According to court records, Crichlow did two years in prison after being convicted on drug charges in 2001. He’s currently engaged to a correction officer, family members said.

But the Rev. Richard Hogan, the respected pastor of the Divine Deliverance Ministry in Jamaica and the uncle of Crichlow and Fields, said Crichlow is always being stopped by the police.

“My nephew was driving a gray Chrysler with tinted windows when he was stopped on this occasion,” said Hogan. “(Cops) said they thought they saw him make a transaction. They didn’t find anything on him.”

Hogan said officers had pulled Crichlow out of the car when witnesses ran to get Fields, who was playing basketball nearby.

“Raynard was still 80 yards away when he was pushed down by a police officer,” Hogan said. “He’s a polite kid, never had a problem with police, he was just running over to see what happened to his brother and he was attacked.”

Crichlow’s cousin said she tried to record the arrest, but a cop snatched her phone.

“(Cops) were kicking (Crichlow) in the face, stomping him, leaning on him with their knees,” said cousin Tyniera Hogan, 32. “He was trying to get up, but they kept pushing him back down . . . it didn’t look like he was resisting.”

Hogan said Crichlow was taken to a hospital with bumps and bruises.

“Some officers don’t have the respect to serve,” Hogan said of the cops who arrested his nephews and sparked the outrage. “Kids got mad and the community got mad.”

Police said no arrests were made at the stationhouse. Charges against Crichlow and Fields were pending.

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PSA # 7 (Formerly 28 Pct. ) P.O. Jose Tejada

NYPD Officer indicted for armed robbery and narcotics trafficking

By: Gailann Jarocki — Friday, April 5th, 2013 ‘The Examiner.com’

Loretta E. Lynch, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Brian R. Crowell, Special Agent in Charge, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), New York, and Raymond W. Kelly, Commissioner, New York City Police Department announced yesterday evening that a superseding indictment was unsealed in federal court in Brooklyn charging New York City Police Officer Jose Tejada, 45 and a 17-year veteran of the NYPD with armed robbery conspiracy, narcotics distribution conspiracy, and the unlawful use of a firearm.

At the time of the robberies, Tejada was assigned to the 28th Precinct in Harlem and committed at least one of the robberies while on duty and in uniform. He is currently assigned to Police Service Area 7 of the NYPD Housing Bureau, located in the Bronx. He was added as a defendant to a previously filed indictment against a violent crew responsible for more than one hundred armed robberies of narcotics traffickers in the New York City metropolitan area that netted more than 250 kilograms of cocaine and $1 million in drug proceeds.

According to the government’s filings, Tejada personally participated in three robberies in 2006 and 2007. While on duty and in uniform, he used his status as a police officer to demand and gain access to a private residence in the Bronx, which the crew mistakenly believed the residents to be drug dealers. Tejada brandished his service weapon at the family of three, who had no involvement in drug dealings, while he and two other crew members unsuccessfully searched the premises for drugs.

It was also shown in government’s filings that Tejada helped robbery crew members pose as police officers by supplying them with NYPD equipment and paraphernalia. He also searched confidential law enforcement databases to determine whether there were outstanding warrants in the names of his confederates. The superseding indictment and a detention letter filed by the government, detailed that in the beginning of 2001, members of the robbery crew, posing as police officers, staged arrests of drug traffickers, using fake arrest and search warrants, and then forcibly took drugs and money from the traffickers. Members of the crew, that included actual officers, restrained a drug traffickers with handcuffs, rope, and duct tape and in other robberies, crew members brandished firearms and assaulted their victims.

Jose Tejada was arraigned later in the day before United States Magistrate Judge Marilyn D. Go at the U.S. Courthouse, 225 Cadman Plaza East, Brooklyn, New York. Twenty-one members of the robbery crew, including a second NYPD officer and an auxiliary NYPD officer, have previously been convicted in the case. If convicted, Tejada faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment on the narcotics and firearms charges.

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73 Precinct Rookie Patrick Prince's Fatal Off-duty MVA

Speed seen as factor in Brooklyn cop-crash death

Officer Patrick Prince, 22, was killed at 4:15 a.m. Thursday on Kings Highway in East Flatbush — just 10 minutes after he signed out after ending his tour at the 73rd Precinct.

By Rocco Parascandola — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The New York Daily News’

The rookie cop killed in an off-duty accident was likely speeding when he lost control of his car and smashed into a tree, police sources said Friday.

Officer Patrick Prince, 22, was killed at 4:15 a.m. Thursday on Kings Highway in East Flatbush — just 10 minutes after he signed out after ending his tour at the 73rd Precinct. He lost control of his car, drifted off the road and slammed into a tree at Beverly Road.

His mother told The News he took the police test the first chance he got, fulfilling his dream of becoming an NYPD officer. He became a cop last July.

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NYPD History

Answers to Questions About New York
(Thomas Byrnes: Not the First to Establish a ‘Rogues Gallery of Photographs’)

By MICHAEL POLLAK — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The New York Times’

Q. Thomas F. Byrnes, who became New York City’s chief of detectives in 1880, is often credited with establishing the first extensive illustrated police catalog of known criminals, as the F.Y.I. column of Jan. 20 reported. But hadn’t the New York Police Department opened a rogues’ gallery of photographs of villains well before his time?

A. F.Y.I. thanks George A. Thompson for leading us to earlier accounts of such a gallery near the dawn of both The New York Times and photography. Chief Byrnes greatly expanded police information on criminals, and had officers take “mug shots” of often unwilling suspects, but smaller efforts had been undertaken earlier, as The Times reported on Dec. 5, 1857, under the headline “Daguerreotype Gallery of Criminals at the Detective Police Office”:

“At the headquarters of the Detective Police, at the corner of Broome and Elm Streets, in this city, Sergeant Lefferts has commenced a gallery of daguerreotype portraits, that promises to do good service to the community. A few weeks since, the idea struck him that the old plan of a verbal description of a rascal’s personal appearance entered on the police books, as to height, complexion, age, etc., might be greatly amended. He accordingly made arrangements with a daguerreotypist to take, in a cheap but correct manner, the portraits of such notabilities in the ranks of pickpockets, burglars, etc.” The article went on to report: “The result, so far, is 28 likenesses of well-authenticated culprits, male and female. No portrait is taken unless the party is well-known to the police as an old and hardened offender.”

The reporter examined the file and wrote: “Of the 28 persons exhibited, only two were badly dressed.”

A follow-up article on June 7, 1858, said the daguerreotype file had grown to several hundred, but the reporter was skeptical about the quality of the likenesses and added that many of the criminals would normally use disguises. The picture file, without confidential information, was open to the public, “but even to the curious, it affords little satisfaction,” the article said, explaining: “A more commonplace, and, to all appearances a more respectable-looking set of customers could not be discovered in the showcase of any daguerrotypist in the city.”

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THE REAL DEAL: Sergeant William H. Lefferts, at the time, held the title of “Acting Chief of Detectives.” The newly established ‘Metropolitan Police Department’ “Detective Force” was given a command numerical precinct designation: “The 25th Precinct.”

It replaced the N.Y.C. Municipal P.D. detective squad, which was known as “Squad V” or the “V Squad” [The letter ‘V’, not the Roman numerical ‘V’] The Metropolitan P.D.'s detective force's office was located at police headquarters, 413 Broome Street. (It had just moved from 88 White Street.)

William Lefferts was replaced by Captain George Washington Walling, who was the first person to the hold the title of “Chief of Detectives” on any police department that policed New York City.

NOTE: Jacob Hays was the first person to give himself the title of “Chief of Detectives” in 1836. However, New York City didn't have a police department at the time.

And despite what you may have read or seen on the screen (Gangs of New York); Jacob Hays, at the time, was grossly obese and couldn't catch a cold. He was a career politician, newspaper editor and publisher of a number of newspapers. Not to mention that he had a massive ego (sound familiar) and wrote his own stories too! - Mike Bosak

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1st Precinct P.O. Felix Recio

Charges Dropped Against Ferrari 458 Spider Owner Who ‘Drove Over Policeman’s Foot’

By Unnamed Author(s) — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘GTspirit.Com’

Julien Chabbott, who many will remember as being the man who ‘drove’ over a NYC police officers foot, appeared in front of the Manhattan criminal court on Thursday. Chabbott was informed that prosecutors had dropped his misdemeanor assault case.

A social media entrepreneur, Chabbott gained a lot of support from a YouTube video shot by Damian Mory, a passerby. The video appeared to show the officer repeatedly putting his foot in front of the car’s front wheel. At the point where Chabbott was alleged to have assaulted the officer, the car doesn’t move an inch.

Later the officer is seen pulling the driver from his car to perform an arrest. While Chabbott’s reaction to getting a parking ticket was entirely wrong, the officer in question appears to have been very heavy handed about the incident.

A lawyer for the NYPD officer said that he would file a civil suit within 30 days. It is unclear why it has taken over 6 months to resolve the criminal case. The area Chabbott was parked in was a supposed valet spot for the Mercer Hotel. It has since been reported by the hotel than the Ferrari 458 Spider was parked with the hotel’s permission.

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Retired P.O. Marty Golden Supports PBA Position / Fights Bloomberg / Takes Heat

Targeting Marty Golden, speed-camera enemy number one

By Dana Rubinstein — Friday, April 5th, 2013; 3:20 p.m. ‘Capital New York.Com’ / New York, NY

Today at noon, a group of Bay Ridge resident-activists gathered outside State Senator Marty Golden's office to protest his opposition to speed cameras in New York City.

"The point is you need to be in support of traffic-calming measures," said Maureen Landers, an organizer of today's demonstration. "And his vote against [speed cameras] shows that clearly he’s not and he has not provided an alternative or a solution or taken any measures to calm traffic."

Four years ago, Landers was pushing an empty stroller across Fourth Avenue in Bay Ridge (in the crosswalk, with the signal) on her way to pick up her children when a woman who was making a turn onto Fourth Avenue drove into her, dragging Landers, and the stroller she was holding onto, down the street.

Onlookers, unaware that the stroller was empty, cried out, "Where are the babies? Where are the babies?"

Landers fractured her elbow and damaged her jaw, but the police, when they arrived, told her they couldn't issue any citations because they themselves had not witnessed the accident.

Landers went on to help found BRAKES (Bay Ridge Advocates for Keeping Everyone Safe), the group organizing today's rally outside of the state senator's office.

Why target Golden?

Bay Ridge, like many New York City neighborhoods, has its share of careless drivers.

In the past few weeks, a woman was killed by a car on 86th Street and Fourth Avenue, and another woman was severely injured by a vehicle at 86th Street and Third Avenue.

Golden, the Republican former cop who represents Bay Ridge in the State Senate, is one of the primary opponents of a request from Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration to install up to 40 speed cameras at intersections citywide.

Speed cameras work by automatically taking photos of the license plates of vehicles that speed, enabling the NYPD to issue tickets accordingly.

The Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, to which Golden is close, strongly opposes the measure, arguing that it would lead to fewer cops on the streets.

And so the cameras were excluded from this year's state budget.

"Marty Golden is completely tone-deaf and oblivious to the impact this technology could have on keeping our streets safer," said Andrew Gounardes, a Bay Ridge attorney who tried to unseat Golden last year and is considering running against him again.

Golden's office sent over the following comment:

"Like the parents here today, I share with them the concern for the safety of our children. Other locations across the United States have found speed camera technology unreliable. If we can prove that the technology is sound, and document unequivocally that it will reduce speeding and fatalities, that would provide reason to consider the possibility of speed camera legislation.

“We need to reduce speeding around schools, by setting up safety zones as well as increasing traffic lights, speed humps, stop signs and reduce the speed limits around schools 10 miles per hour to 20 mph. In the coming days I will be introducing legislation to create these speed zones throughout New York City school zones to reduce speeding near our educational institutions. It is clear, however, that the most effective way to reduce speeding and speeding related fatalities is increased police and prosecution of reckless driving."

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U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York

U .S. Attorney Added Staff to Fight Corruption

By WILLIAM K. RASHBAUM — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The New York Times’

The two federal cases that mesmerized Albany this week — a state senator accused of trying to bribe his way onto the New York City mayoral ballot and an assemblyman charged with taking payoffs to write made-to-order legislation — come as federal prosecutors in Manhattan have increased their focus on political corruption, officials said on Friday.

The two cases, brought by the office of Preet Bharara, the United States attorney in Manhattan, and in the works for several years, developed after the office’s public corruption unit had begun to grow and use more aggressive tactics, a process that began at least four years ago, according to Richard B. Zabel, the deputy United States attorney.

The unit, which had about half a dozen assistant United States attorneys in 2009, now has 10; an additional 4 prosecutors work in a satellite office in White Plains, handling mostly political corruption cases, Mr. Zabel said. One of the White Plains prosecutors was involved in the case against the state senator, Malcolm A. Smith, a Democrat from Queens. Prosecutors in other units in the office, he said, also work at times on political corruption cases.

“The growth was because we need to increase our enforcement in this area, we need more prosecutors to have more time to look at these cases,” Mr. Zabel said.

Political corruption cases are hard to investigate because they usually involve conspiracies between two people, and unless one of them cooperates with the authorities and helps gather or provide evidence against the other, the government’s options are limited. These kinds of crimes often take place amid a constellation of regular, legal political deals that may not be easily distinguishable from those that are criminal unless investigators have inside information.

And while the world of corrupt politicians includes those whose schemes sometimes seem so poorly thought through that they make investigators scratch their heads — like the plan Senator Smith is accused of to get on the Republican mayoral ballot — it is also populated by shrewd and savvy criminals wary of law enforcement and knowledgeable about how it operates.

Mr. Bharara, sworn in as United States attorney in 2009, has said that public corruption cases are, along with terrorism and securities fraud, a top priority.

His office brings such prosecutions, and to some degree oversees the investigations that lead to them. Most often, the investigations are conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the city’s Department of Investigation, and at times by some of the 16 investigators who work for the United States attorney’s office.

In recent years, Mr. Bharara’s office, like that of the F.B.I. and his colleague across the East River, Loretta E. Lynch, the Brooklyn United States attorney, have been using increasingly aggressive tactics in public corruption investigations, as they have in securities fraud cases — tactics more traditionally associated with investigations involving drugs and organized crime.

Mr. Zabel noted that the case announced this week involving the assemblyman, Eric A. Stevenson, a Bronx Democrat, who was accused of writing legislation to benefit a businessman in exchange for bribes, was handled in part by a retired police detective, John Barry, who works as an investigator in Mr. Bharara’s office and who for years focused on international narcotics traffickers.

In that case, another assemblyman, who had been indicted on perjury charges by state prosecutors in the Bronx and was cooperating with Mr. Bharara’s office, wore a hidden recorder to gather information in the investigation, serving as a mole in the Legislature.

But it was far from the first time that such aggressive tactics reached into the Legislature itself. In 2008, an F.B.I. undercover agent, working with prosecutors in Mr. Bharara’s office who were investigating Assemblyman Anthony S. Seminerio, met with Mr. Seminerio in his Assembly office and was invited to the floor of the chamber.

George Venizelos, the assistant director in charge of the F.B.I.’s New York office, said the bureau had also increased its resources focused on public corruption cases. “They’re some of the most important cases the F.B.I. works, because it’s important that the government maintains the public trust,” he said, “because without the public trust, the government has trouble working.”

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U.S.A.

As cities lay off police, frustrated neighborhoods turn to private cops

With cities cutting their police to balance budgets, some well-to-do neighborhoods are hiring private security, marking an expansion of unarmed guards beyond office parks and gated communities.

By Chris Stein — Saturday, April 6th, 2013 ‘The Christian Science Monitor’ / Boston, MA

Oakland, Calif. -- On the streets of Oakland, budget cuts have made the beat cop a rare breed, and some of the city’s wealthy neighborhoods have turned to unarmed security guards to take their place.

After people in Oakland’s wealthy enclaves like Oakmore or Piedmont Pines head to work, security companies take over, cruising the quiet streets to ward off burglars looking to take advantage of unattended homes.

“With less law enforcement on the streets and more home crime or perception of home crime, people are wanting something to replace that need,” says Chris de Guzman, chief operating officer of First Alarm, a company that provides security to about 100 homes in Oakland. “That’s why they’re calling us and bringing companies like us aboard to provide that deterrent.”

Long known for patrolling shopping malls and gated communities, private security firms are beginning to spread into city streets. While private security has long been contracted by homeowners associations and commercial districts, the trend of groups of neighbors pooling money to contract private security for their streets is something new.

Besides Oakland, neighborhoods in Atlanta and Detroit – both cities with high rates of crime – have hired firms to patrol their neighborhoods, says Steve Amitay, executive director of the National Association of Security Contractor.

“It’s happening everywhere,” Mr. Amitay says. “Municipal governments and cities are really getting strapped in terms of their resources, and when a police department cuts 100 officers obviously they are going to respond to less crimes.”

Revenue into cities has drooped every year since 2007, according to the National League of Cities. Oakland, already struggling with one of the highest murder rates in the nation, laid off 80 police officers in 2010, though some have been rehired, says Sgt. Arturo Bautista, a department spokesman.

That has cut down on the amount of time patrol officers can spend watching over neighborhoods, Sergeant Bautista says. “Because of the short staff and the calls for service, officers are pretty much going from call to call to call.”

Meanwhile, the private security industry is projected to grow by about 19 percent – from 1 million to 1.2 million guards – between 2010 and 2020, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Most of that growth will come because private firms are doing jobs once held by law enforcement, according to the bureau.

Doug Mosher, a resident of Oakland’s Montclair neighborhood who helps coordinate a local security council, says many residents were miffed by what they felt was a lack of response by the police to crimes in their neighborhoods.

“Over the past few years there’s been an uptick of crime break-ins in our area,” Mr. Mosher says. “At its current staffing level, [the police] are just unable to provide regular patrols up in the neighborhoods.”

In his neighborhood, burglars have broken into houses and stolen whatever they can get, Mr. Mosher says. Neighbors have struck back; take a drive through Oakland’s hilly neighborhoods and every other block seems to have a sign warning off criminals, sometimes adorned with a photo of a burglar taken from a homeowner’s personal security camera.

De Guzman said the uptick in interest in hiring his firm has been recent, likely due to the recession and the layoffs of police in Oakland and other cities. And where his officers are patrolling, de Guzman says crime has dropped and thieves are looking for other districts to loot.

Several studies have shown that private security is effective in fighting crime. For example, a 2011 study by professors from Duke University and University of Pennsylvania found that private security was responsible for an 11 percent drop in crime in business areas of Los Angeles where they had been deployed.

One concern, however, is that the security officers could be vulnerable to civil litigation. Regulation of private security varies between states and cities, says Seugmug Lee, an assistant professor at Western Illinois University who studies private security companies.

"Legal issues [are] the major challenges to private security companies and security patrol. We don’t have a universal guideline or ... law unlike the public police," Professor Lee says. "Can they carry a weapon? According to our common law, legal tradition, they might, but what’s the boundary, what’s the guidelines? Each municipality has its own rules or regulation."

Beyond the legal issues, private security is also hardly a one-size-fits-all solution. Thus far, the patrols are mostly confined to the few blocks in Oakland that can pay for them.

“We’re not getting calls from lower or middle income neighborhoods,” de Guzman says. “Generally it’s the neighborhoods that can afford it and it’s generally the neighborhoods that have the most to lose.”

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Mike Bosak

Saturday, April 6, 2013