Today, Police Commissioner William Bratton announced that administrative charges are being filed against 19 uniformed members of 40th Precinct in connection with the findings of an internal audit of crime classifications. An audit of crime complaint reports for the 40th Precinct, conducted by the NYPD’s Quality Assurance Division (QAD), has identified a number of instances of alleged failure to process crime complaints properly during a four-month period in 2014.
During an audit of the precinct, which included a review of radio call response activity, as well as the inspection of 1,558 complaint reports, the QAD audit team noted 55 such instances. The majority of these reports were in the five general offense categories of: petit larceny; lost property; misdemeanor assault; criminal mischief and criminal trespass.
As a result of these findings, administrative disciplinary action is being commenced against 19 members of the 40th Precinct. One lieutenant, eight sergeants, nine police officers and one detective are subject to departmental charges and specifications in connection with this matter. Based on the findings of the QAD audit, the commanding officer of the 40th Precinct has been administratively transferred.
All 55 complaint reports are being corrected to reflect the proper offense categories. As a result, the overall crime statistics for the 40th Precinct for 2014 have been recalculated from a previously reported decrease of 14% to an adjusted decrease of 11.4%.
The NYPD Department Advocate is filing charges against these 19 officers.
“These disciplinary charges are strict but fair,” said Police Commissioner William Bratton. “The purposeful misrepresentation of crime data is rare but nevertheless unacceptable, and it will be dealt with accordingly. Once our internal reporting systems and quality-assurance audit process identified violations of our guidelines, we initiated disciplinary proceedings. Commanders are held strictly accountable for the integrity of crime complaint reporting within their commands. Policing in the CompStat era requires that the accuracy of our numbers must be unquestionable. This is why we improved our audit process soon after I was appointed and continue to seek improvements in this area. These statistics provide the very basis upon which our crime-fighting strategies are formulated and our resources allocated. I will not tolerate any misconduct that might undermine public confidence in the hard work of the thousands of officers who have made this the safest large city in America.”
Under Commissioner Bratton, the NYPD created a new proactive Risk Management Bureau that monitors the performance of every unit within the Department. The bureau’s Quality Assurance Division conducts bi-annual audits of crime reporting practices for all precincts, transit districts and housing patrol service areas. In addition, enhanced audits are performed where reporting anomalies are detected or alleged.
