he district attorney gives you two choices: Resign from the job or face perjury charges for processing an arrest you didn’t make. This is serious, career-ending business we’re talking about. And the DA doesn’t care why or how it happened. All he or she knows now is that you wrote “at TPO, PO observed….” and signed your name attesting to its accuracy.

Regardless of how you wound up writing up the arrest, if you weren’t on the scene, didn’t see the crime or didn’t make the observations that you’re writing into an arrest report, you’d better be sure to note who did. Because when circumstances occur that result in an ADA questioning you about the arrest — and they do frequently — and you have to say you processed it at the direction of a boss, or for a team member who had to leave, you are left facing perjury charges. We have, right now, several fellow officers in that exact predicament.

Regardless of whether the person had committed the crime charged, the DA’s offices in every borough intend to prosecute these situations.

They intend to make examples of cops who process an arrest for another cop or boss and don’t take the time to write “I was informed by… who observed…”

They don’t care that your boss told you to write up a collar that he made or if it was your turn in your unit’s rotation to collar up. All they care about is that the arrest report gives a clear account of who saw what and who did what. So if the boss directs you to process a collar, then you have to include that “Sgt. So-and- so informed me that he observed the individual with a gun” so that when it goes to court, that sergeant will be called to testify. Two simple words, “informed by,” can save your job.

Invariably, the questions start flying when a collar starts making the typical kinds of complaints. And when the DA comes back to the name on the dotted line, the cop has to explain that he or she took the collar for a partner. And no mitigating circumstances will satisfy the ADA, who doesn’t care that your partner couldn’t work overtime because he or she had a first communion to go to or had to pick up the kids, or that it was your turn in the unit to collar up.

The bottom line is that you can’t write “at time and place of occurrence” if you weren’t there. You can’t be two places at once. So if you and your sergeant have to split up to collar two suspects who fled in opposite directions, then the arrest report must reflect that. From now on, we’re all going to have to take great care in putting down the details and we’ll have to say “Sgt. So-and-so informed me that he observed suspect…” And if the boss objects because he or she doesn’t want to go to court later on just tell the boss that you need to accurately state the facts and consult your PBA delegate.

Remember, it’s resignation or indictment.