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It's not a problem that's new to the PD. Quota systems were in existence before I came onto the job, in 1982. They've been in existence the entire time. But the intensity has increased, and that's where you're getting the cops saying that they've had enough.What's better than saying, "Your activity is low,"? Wow, that's a term: My activity is low, in this one area. It gives you the reason to start writing me up, harassing me, disciplining me. Also, it targets people by destroying their career long-term, because once you get hit with certain types of discipline, even when you're up for promotions and up for transfers, you're a problem child. We don't want you getting that next assignment. Just stay where you're at. So it limits your career. It stifles it. And I think that's why officers say they have enough.
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When you look at where the majority of summonses are given, you'd be amazed to see that all of those summonses will start narrowing down just to an area that happens to be black and Hispanic, or poor. Those are your three targeted areas: black and Hispanic because they don't have lawyers. The chances of fighting back, or recording it, is very little. They pay the fine. They can't take off from work or do certain things to prevent it.It's also something that they ask you when you're up for promotion.How's your activity? Not just arrests."Oh, I got 50 arrests!" Which is outstanding! Well, how many summonses did you get? "I didn't get many." Well, that's a problem. You must be non-compliant. You must be a fighter of the system.
Absolutely. I saw it every day. When I was supervisor in East New York, because I was so active, they tried to give me all the problem officers of the command. These guys were getting zeroes—absolutely no activity. So I had a meeting with all of them. I said, "I'll make you a deal. I'm not asking you to become the top of the precinct, I'm asking you to give me something. You see something, you give me something. If you give me one or two, that's fine. Just give me something, so I can defend you."When the PD targets you, they say, "Tag you're it!" Once you're deemed it—the person to go after—you get it from every supervisor, from every rank. You're literally on such a high alert, that it's so stressful, it creates a problem to begin with. So these officers ask me, "If we do this for you, are you gonna get them to stop messing with us?" And I'd say, "Sure, you're in my squad now. Not one other boss will write you up. Not one other sergeant, without having a confrontation with me." I even said, "If you're drunk the night before, or you have an emergency, you got the day off."
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It doesn't matter who's at the top. The message from the top has to be that you won't be disciplined for not hitting these numbers. That you give summonses and take action according to what you see. That's what it is. We're not a revenue-generating agency. It should've never been that. And that's what it is right now.Statistically, it's impossible that an entire precinct of officers every month, the miracle that they come out with the same numbers. They all end up with one arrest per quarter, twenty-five summonses. And that's even more amazing—not only did you get twenty-five summonses, but you got twenty-five in the exact order they required: three of these, five of those, fifteen of these. It's always the same spread. It's the miracle of performance. It's not a quota system; it's performance goals.No, it's called bullshit.So where is the lawsuit at now?
They haven't even gotten to court yet. The city's position is always to delay, delay, delay, because they have resources. By the time you get to trial, you'll have reached your twenty years, and you can retire. Or you'll get so fed up that you'll quit. The strain you go through, going home every day, you finally give up. You say, Damn, I've had enough of this shit. What do you want me to do? What is it that I have to do so you guys can just leave me alone?
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Just so you understand—and I had this conversation with the attorneys and plaintiffs—most lawsuits are about money. So they pay out billions of dollars and try to clean up the people's records; that's what you end up with in a lawsuit that just goes to trial. But if, before trial, you come to terms with it, and you agree to it, you can create more systemic change in an agency than a lawsuit can. A lawsuit can give you compensation, but it can't change the rules.A settlement changes the rules, the processes, it creates protections. Our lawsuit that we filed—$26.8 million that it settled for—we were the first, and we were naïve. We had federal oversight for five years. And on the anniversary of the fifth year, when there was no more oversight and we couldn't get back in the court, they dismantled all the protections we put into place. We didn't know. Class-action lawyers are concerned with getting their paycheck. So when you settle and they have private meetings, you say, "No more private meetings. Fuck you. I'm gonna be a part of every meeting you have, and when we settle for systemic changes, that can't be temporary—they have to be permanent changes." So it exists past the new commissioner, or chief.We've never had an investigative body that has oversight over the PD. We have plenty of people who have oversight—the new inspector general, the city council, all kinds of groups. Bt nobody cares enough to take the necessary work the next step. Get into the nitty gritty: Give me, randomly, five activity reports from every officer from every shift citywide.They just don't want to fight the PD. Oversight has to have independence, ability, and competency. You gotta want to have change; if not, it's ineffective. You give people nice jobs, nice salaries, and they generate nice, hundred-page reports. But nothing changes. You didn't fix nothing, you didn't change nothing, you didn't do nothing. And everything is that way for the next guy who comes in and wants better results for the future.But the future never comes for police officers.This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.Follow John on Twitter.