NYCLU Highlights The School To Prison Pipeline

With the possible reform of the Rockefeller Drug Laws in the news, legislators would be good to notice another chronic problem of the prison system, the school to prison pipeline:

A Holiday Greeting Sen. Diaz Deserves

Here ya go Senator:

NYPD Continues To Ilegally Arrest Children

For the most part the NYPD does their job just fine but far too often it is found they are up to no good. The NYCLU is protesting their practice of wrongly arresting children, some as young as eleven for minor offenses. The law states kids under 16 cannot be arrested for non-criminal violations, but obviously the NYPD doesn't care about the laws that govern their own behavior.

From The NYCLU:

New York State law prohibits children younger than 16 from being arrested for minor, non-criminal violations like loitering. If a child commits a minor infraction at school, he may be disciplined, but the Family Court Act prohibits police from arresting the child. But according to NYPD data obtained in a Freedom of Information Law request, between 2005 and 2007, approximately 300 New York City public school students were illegally arrested in or on school grounds for non-criminal violations. And when the children were arrested, they were handcuffed, forcibly removed from school and taken to police precincts.

In a letter sent to Kelly late yesterday, the NYCLU and ACLU informed the NYPD of the situation and urged the department to immediately end the illegal practice.

“These children aren’t criminals. The NYPD must follow the law and stop treating them like they are,” said NYCLU Executive Director Donna Lieberman. “Arresting children for minor infractions in their own schools – in front of their teachers and peers – only stigmatizes and humiliates them.”

Section 305.2 of the Family Court Act states that warrantless arrest of children younger than 16 is illegal unless they have committed crimes. Under New York law, a “crime” includes a felony or misdemeanor but not the minor infractions for which students are being arrested.

The police may want to treat everyone as a criminal regardless of their age but clearly they do not care about the macro-level consequences of their actions. That law is in place for a very good reason and it is best that they stop messing with it. For too many communities, society dictates a playground to prison mentality that teaches kids that the law is not on their side. If the children are doing something wrong and the violation is a minor one, then treat them as kids and return them to their parents or care giver. Also, instead of spending all this money on school law enforcement, we should spend those dollars on teaching the kids, not arresting them.

On Election Day, Vote For Obama But Don't Wear Your Support To The Polls

More than a hundred million people will vote for the next President of the United States on November 4th and most will be inevitably be Obama supporters. However, those of us voting for change instead of more than the same should be forewarned about wearing Obama gear. Here in New York City, Obama buttons, t-shirts and hats can be seen everywhere on the streets and posters adorn many windows above. To avoid any trouble when casting your ballot, the NYCLU is telling people to leave the gak at home and simply bring your ability to vote.

From The NYCity News Service:

An obscure, seldom-enforced state law bars anyone from wearing political buttons and other campaign paraphernalia within “a 100-foot radial measured from the entrances of the voting booth.”

With the election just over a month away, the law is suddenly gaining notice: an email begging potential Obama voters to “PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE” leave T-shirts and buttons home on Election Day is circulating on the Internet – spurring worried calls and emails to state election officials. The New York Civil Liberties Union plans – for the first time – to include a similar warning in its voter information materials.

Meanwhile, Republican leaders in Pennsylvania are calling on officials to enforce that state’s similar “passive electioneering” law banning campaign paraphernalia at the polls, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported Sept. 19.

In New York, election officials said they would stick to the law even as they tried to downplay concerns.

However you may feel about the law, it can not and will not be changed before election day. So keep it in mind. On November 4th electioneers will be doing whatever they can to make sure their candidate is elected. One side will be trying to get as many people to the polls and the other will be preventing a large swath of the population. So make their job a little harder here in New York and wear your Obama stuff after, or put a sweatshirt over the Obama t-shirt and hide the button for the few minutes spent at your local polling site.

NYCLU Tries To Shine Light On NYPD's Attack On Privacy

When the NYPD isn't beating down bicyclists, they're busy trying to install cameras to record anything and everything in order to turn our city into a police state. Operation Sentinel is one step towards that goal and not everyone is happy about it (surprise!). The NYCLU is taking the lead in the fight against the cops by trying to uncover some details about the program, but police officials are trying especially hard to stay in out of the public's flashlight.

From The Gothamist:

The NYCLU is concerned because, per the group's associate legal director Christopher Dunn, "the police tracking millions of law-abiding New Yorkers...has profound privacy implications." The NYCLU wants information about the scope of information to be collected, how the police will use the information, who the information will be shared with, what privacy protections will be included, and many more things.

Referring to the reports of Operation Sentinel (aka Operation Photograph Every Single Car in NYC), executive director Donna Lieberman said, "The public and our elected officials can’t keep reading about these programs in the paper." The NYPD's response? Spokesman Paul Browne told the NY Times, "We have already provided the N.Y.C.L.U. with information short of a road map for terrorists to use in another attack on the financial district."

While the cops can respond with childish retorts, people's privacy is a serious matter. Recording every car that goes in and out of the city may be no big deal for those that would call Patrick Henry a terrorist-sympathizer. Though for those that still like to adhere to the Constitution and the ideals of our founding fathers when it comes to the issues of life, liberty and property the pursuit of happiness, Operation Sentinel needs to be closely watched. More so than the NYPD plans to watch us.

Group Forms To Fight Council's Effort To Rescind Term Limits

With all the activity surrounding the primary elections coming up tomorrow, the battle over term limits can easily be lost in the fray. That is why concerned citizens and good government groups are coming together to fight back against the Mayor and City Council's effort to rescind what the people put in place in the 90s. The people voted for our elected officials to serve two terms and two terms only and People Have Spoken Coalition is determined to keep it that way.

From The NY Sun:

"We call upon our fellow New Yorkers — anyone and everyone — to join us in this important citywide effort in maintaining the existing law," a former head of the New York Civil Liberties Union, Norman Siegel, who helped organize the event, said. "The City Council should not undo the people's will."

Mr. Siegel was joined by several local leaders, including City Council Member Bill de Blasio and state Senator Eric Adams.

New Yorkers voted to support term limits in two referendums during the 1990s. Now, with about two-thirds of the City Council set to be forced from office next year, along with the popular Mayor Bloomberg, legislators have discussed changing the law anyway.

No such bill has yet been submitted, but those in favor of term limits are trying to beat it to the punch. A billionaire businessman, Ronald Lauder, financed a television ad campaign this weekend comparing politicians to diapers that need to be changed regularly. Mr. Siegel said the coalition announced yesterday will coordinate with Mr. Lauder's group, New Yorkers for Term Limits.

Backed by a few prominent politicians and big money in the way of Ronald Lauder, this is no small operation. It really is a shame that we have to fight back against council members that resist the public's wishes. If they really wanted to do this in a just manner, it would have been put to a vote across the city, not just for the 51 members of the Council. Congrats to Bill de Blasio for bucking the trend and for everyone that stands up to this anti-democratic maneuver.

Broadway Cares...About Civil Liberties

Not only do they work to fight HIV and AIDS, now the creative class that makes Broadway what it's known for is teaming up with the NYCLU to speak out for our civil liberties:

NYPD Looks Multicultural On The Outside, But Not Inside

The NYPD has always been a controversial force in New York City. Race and class have been two strong factors about that controversy and it continues on into 2008. The NYCLU released a report today showing how race is really played out in the ranks, how force is used and how it is being kept track of.

From The NYCLU:

• During the last two years the NYPD reported the race of those shot by police, nearly 90 percent of the people shot at by officers were black or Latino. In 1998 the Department stopped reporting the race of civilian targets and started reporting the breed of dogs being shot.
• The NYPD command structure remains almost entirely white. At the end of 2002, 85.3 percent of the 735 members of the NYPD at or above the rank of captain were white males, with blacks holding only 3.9 percent of those positions. At the end of 2007, after five years of a large number of retirements and promotions, 84.3 percent of leadership positions were held by white males, with the numbers of blacks actually shrinking to 3.7 percent.
• In 77 percent of the incidents where officers fired their weapons at civilians between 1999 and 2006, the officers were the only ones shooting, with officers often shooting at unarmed civilians (like Sean Bell and Amadou Diallo).
• In 2006 (the most recent year for which there is information), police officers fired an average of five shots per incident when they were the only ones shooting, which is the highest number for the entire eight years for which these figures have been reported.

Those are serious numbers that, as Donna Lieberman of the NYCLU remarked, scream out for serious review. The police and race relations are as important as they were decades ago. Race is still a problem for the police, and without a serious investigation and enforcement of real reform, we'll be looking at the same numbers in another ten, twenty or thirty years from now.

The Unspoken Part Of Congestion Pricing

Robert Perry of the NYCLU points out a very important issue that the media fails to talk about in the midst of all the congestion pricing hoopla. Sure the money is important, but so is your right to privacy.

New York State Infringes The Right To A Public Defense

From the NYCLU:

If you are accused of a crime and cannot afford an attorney, you have the right to be provided meaningful and effective counsel.

It is a right that New Yorkers take for granted.

It is a right denied to hundreds of New Yorkers every day.

It is a right that all New Yorkers have the right to a spirited public defense. It is a travesty that those that can not afford an attorney do not have a fair defense.

Len Levitt Scorned By The NYPD

Len used to write a police column for Newsday and now does it by himself with his great blog NYPD Confidential. Apparently some of his writings have pissed off the wrong people (e.g. Police Commish Kelly) and they decided to pull his press pass. Well Len has words for them, care of the New York Civil Liberties Union:

More Sneaky Tricks From The NYPD

Operation Lucky Bag is a deceptive name for a new type of sting set up by the New York Police Department. There is no luck involved here, if anything it would be bad luck to be associated with this, like what happened to Carlos Alayo. Being a Good Samaritan, he intended to try and take the wallet he found on a subway bench to the rightful owner, but the cops caught up to him first.

From WCBS-TV:

The 32-year-old had been ensnared in Operation Lucky Bag, an initiative from the New York City Police Department to lay decoys—shopping bags, purses, backpacks or wallets—around the subway system under the watchful gaze of officers who wait to see what passersby will do.

The decoys often contain real credit cards issued under pseudonyms to the police department. Theft of a credit card is grand larceny, a felony that could lead to jail time.[...]

The New York Civil Liberties Union said the decoy tactic could deter people from being good Samaritans and should be abandoned.

"I'm sure the NYPD has far more sophisticated tactics at their disposal than dropping wallets on their trains," said NYCLU executive director Donna Lieberman.

How this waste of time could possibly reduce crime is beyond me. Like The NYCLU spokeswoman said, the NYPD must have better ways of catching criminals than this. Police decoys may work to catch drug dealers and child predators, but to use it to catch burglars on the G train is just nuts.

There Is Nothing Civilian About The CCRB

A report done by the New York Civil Liberties Union has shown that the Civilian Complaint Review Board might not be doing the job it was created for. The board should be investigating civil complaints made against the police, but more than half of all cases are easily dismissed, and the rate of finding fault with the cops is significantly under the national average. Are cops just better here, or is there something else going on we should know about?

From AM New York:

Of the nearly 7,000 civilian complaints filed against New York City police officers in 2006, close to 60 percent were dismissed without an investigation, according to the report titled "Mission Failure," which looked at police complaints since 1994.

On average, the Civilian Complaint Review Board found police at fault in just 5.2 percent of complaints - far below the 10 to 13 percent average found at similar boards across the United States, the report said.

The Civilian Complaint Review Board was added to the City of New York Charter in July 1993. The board was tasked with conducting thorough and impartial investigations.

Of course the NYPD quickly came out to slam the report and the NYCLU in general. Who is more believable, a group that fights for civil liberties or the NYPD? First of all this board is compromised of people selected by the Mayor, the City Council and the Police Commissioner. Why would the latter have any say over who gets to do a civilian review. It is called a civilian complaint review board for a reason. On top of that, the Mayor and the council more or less are generally on the same side as the cops. This board doesn't seem fair at all when you look at how people are appointed.

Perhaps instead of trying to dismiss the NYCLU so quickly, the city should review how the board is put together. Perhaps civilians designating other civilians would be a good start. Common sense people...lets get on board here.

NYPD Forced To Reveal Documents On GOP Convention Protesters

A Federal judge issued an order for the NYPD to release all their information pertaining to the GOP Convention protests today. The city fought to keep them remained sealed and what was released showed that the NYPD did not want to be embarrassed by their activities. Nearly a third of 36,500 of the city's finest worked during the convention and some of them went way beyond...and below the call of duty.

From the AP:

City lawyers had argued that the arrests, mainly for disorderly conduct, were justified in part because of intelligence showing certain protesters were threats to the public. But civil rights activists argue the internal documents, many marked "secret," show the nation's largest police department spent tremendous time and resources to conduct surveillance on people who were merely practicing free speech and displaying no sign of criminal intent.

The papers "vindicate the sanity of those people who thought they were being followed," Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said Wednesday at a news conference.

One dispatch detailed plans by the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network to hold a rally featuring Sean "Diddy" Combs, Jay-Z and other rap stars. It concluded that their presence "will likely inflate the total number of participants."

The documents show that the NYPD sought to monitor activists as far away as California and Europe, Lieberman said. They also suggest the department infiltrated protest groups by having undercover officers enter their Internet chat rooms and attend organizing meetings, she added.

This type of information that was documented is incredibly invasive and a warning sign of the police state that the current government seems to endorse. The judge's decision was a good one in that it exposes what our government is sinking to. Free speech does not need to be monitored in this way. Those protesters were peaceful and only meant to express their constitutional right to show their disdain for President Bush and the rest of the Republican party.