The NYPD’s “inconsistent” enforcement during the George Floyd protests earlier this year “heightened tensions” between cops and protesters and suppressed First Amendment rights, according to a scathing new report.
“[T]he problems went beyond poor judgment or misconduct by some individual officers,” the city’s Department of Investigation found, detailing a systemic failure in the department’s response to the mostly peaceful demonstrations.
“The Department itself made a number of key errors or omissions that likely escalated tensions, and certainly contributed to both the perception and the reality that the Department was suppressing rather than facilitating lawful First Amendment assembly and expression.”
PBA president Pat Lynch said Friday the report confirms that cops were sent into harm’s way unprepared.
“The DOI report confirms what police officers knew on the first night of riots,” Lynch said. “Our city leaders sent us out with no plan, no strategy, and no support to deal with unrest that was fundamentally different from any of the thousands of demonstrations that police officers successfully protect every single year.”
“No amount of new training or strategizing will help while politicians continue to undermine police officers and embolden those who create chaos on our streets,” he said.
The long-awaited, 111-page report, which was released Friday morning after six months, doesn’t address allegations concerning individual officers — which it did describe as “unprofessional” at “a minimum” — but admonishes police leadership, without naming any individual officials.
“The response really was a failure on many levels,” Commissioner Margaret Garnett said Friday, detailing a lack of preparation for the “extraordinary policing challenge.”
“I hope they will take the findings seriously … that really goes to the core values of the police department,” she added. “I hope the department is more critical and self-reflective.”
The report criticized police for their use of force and crowd control tactics that “often failed to discriminate between lawful, peaceful protesters and unlawful actors” — contributing to the already firmly held anti-cop sentiment.
It specifically noted that the NYPD’s crowd control tactics “produced excessive enforcement that contributed to heightened tensions.”
“NYPD’s use of force on protesters — encirclement (commonly called ‘kettling’), mass arrests, baton and pepper spray use, and other tactics — reflected a failure to calibrate an appropriate balance between valid public safety or officer safety interests and the rights of protesters to assemble and express their views,” according to the report.
One of the most notable instances of “kettling” came on June 4 when cops corralled and trapped protesters in Mott Haven until they were out past the 8 p.m. curfew — and then violently arrested more than 300 people. A Human Rights Watch report described it as a violation of “international human rights.”
Garnett told reporters that the tactics echoed those used by the NYPD during the 2004 Republican National Convention, which resulted in litigation that the city paid an estimated $18 million to settle in 2014.
Legal documents named now-Chief of Department Terence Monahan as a key figure in developing those controversial strategies.
Mayor Bill de Blasio and Police Commissioner Dermot Shea both praised Monahan following the NYPD’s handling of the Mott Haven protest in June — which came just days after Monahan knelt with protesters in Brooklyn.
But limited police intelligence on the potential for violence at the protest — based on meetings with business leaders and arrests earlier in the day — did not justify the mass arrest, the DOI report said.
Between May 28 and June 5, 2,047 people were arrested during the demonstrations. According to NYPD data, there were 166 felonies, 1,002 misdemeanors and 851 violations.
The report does concede, however, that there were also numerous incidents of violence targeting police — and recognized that the tense nature of the demonstrations “triggered numerous violent confrontations between police and protesters” as well as “widespread allegations that police had used excessive tactics against citizens exercising their First Amendment rights.”
Overall, 386 officers were injured from May 28 to June 11.
But the DOI’s investigation, which was signed off on by Garnett, ultimately concludes that the majority of police officers’ actions were “appropriate.”
The Civilian Complaint Review Board also reported that it received 1,646 protest-related allegations connected to 248 incidents. Allegations of force were the leading accusation with 1,052 complaints.
Additionally, the report criticizes NYPD officials for not having a community affairs strategy, not properly training its officers to handle the demonstrations, and the lack of data and intelligence collection.
“Some policing decisions relied on intelligence without sufficient consideration of context or proportionality,” the DOI said, adding that the Mott Haven response was “disproportionate” with the “absence of evidence of actual violence.”
The mayor, in an unusual videotaped statement released after the report was made public, expressed regret over the department’s behavior.
“I read this report and I agree with it,” de Blasio said in the recorded statement. “It makes very clear we’ve got to do something different, and we’ve got to do something better.”
“I look back with remorse,” de Blasio added. “I wish I had done better. I want everyone to understand that. And I’m sorry I didn’t do better.”
Speaking on Hot97’s “Ebro in the Morning,” de Blasio said Shea “100 percent” agrees with him.
“We accept the recommendations,” the mayor said. “So, it’s his responsibility to put them into action in terms of the NYPD with the other leadership. But it’s my job to make sure that happens with my colleagues at City Hall.”
The NYPD did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment, but Shea said the report offered “thoughtful recommendations” following its release.
“In general terms, the report captured the difficult period that took place in May/June of 2020 and presents 20 logical and thoughtful recommendations that I intend to incorporate into our future policy and training,” Shea said in a statement.