New York City recently reached a settlement in a class action lawsuit against the New York City Police Department (NYPD). The police department was accused of issuing bogus criminal summonses.

The alleged fraud involved hundreds of thousands of summonses that were found to be meritless. In most instances, the summonses were issued against individuals who had been charged with minor criminal offenses such as disorderly conduct and trespassing. Under NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio and previous mayors, cracking down on these types of crimes was a major emphasis of the police force.

Eventually, beginning in 2010, the people who had been wrongly accused of committing crimes that allegedly impacted the “quality of life” of NYC residents decided to fight back. The criminal defendants became plaintiffs in a class action lawsuit that claimed that the NYPD had “selectively and disproportionately” targeted for arrest minorities who lived in certain neighborhoods.

More than 900,000 criminal summonses issued between 2007 and 2015 were implicated by the lawsuit. Remarkably, this number represents roughly one-quarter of all summonses issued by NYC police during the eight-year period. These summonses were ultimately dismissed because they lacked probable cause, suggesting that something very wrong was going on with the way the NYPD was enforcing city and state laws. The “something very wrong” was that police officers were allegedly being instructed to issue criminal summonses regardless of whether any crime or violation had actually occurred. This was allegedly done because New York City officials needed to meet a quota in order to make crime and arrest records look better.

The settlement of the recent class action lawsuit calls for NYC to pay $75 million to those affected by the improper and legally unjustifiable summonses. However, since there were so many people impacted by the NYPD policy, the most that a single individual will receive as a result of the class action settlement is $150 per incident.

Importantly, the proposed deal includes no admission of wrongdoing on the part of New York City or the NYPD. In fact, the settlement will include a denial of the allegation that city officials were trying to meet quotas by ordering cops to issue summonses for minor crimes and ordinance violations.

The settlement must still be approved by a federal judge in Manhattan.

Stop-and-Frisk Policy in New York City

This is not the first time that the NYPD has been accused of selectively going after minorities while enforcing criminal laws. For instance, there were other lawsuits in the past that challenged the stop-and-frisk policy that aimed to crack down on crime in New York City by giving police officers the authority to stop, question, and frisk pedestrians. The problem was that the stop-and-frisk program raised serious concerns about racial profiling and privacy rights, with a large percentage of people affected by the policy being African Americans and Latinos.

The police department’s use of the practice was significantly altered in 2013 after a different class action lawsuit led to a ruling by a U.S. District Court that ordered the NYPD to make sweeping changes to the stop-and-frisk program.

 

If you have been accused of a crime in NY, you should speak with a qualified criminal defense lawyer immediately. The experienced, aggressive criminal attorneys at the LaDuca Law Firm can help you fight your criminal charges. Contact us now to schedule a free initial consultation at our office in Rochester, New York.