Pol faults cops’ sex-crime fight
City Councilwoman Helen Rosenthal slammed Police Commissioner Dermot Shea on Wednesday over what she characterized as halfhearted efforts by the NYPD to fight sex crimes, saying detectives are assigned too many cases to do them justice.
“The number of cases per detective in the adult squad is woefully high, woefully high,” the Manhattan Democrat thundered at Shea during a Council hearing on the NYPD’s budget. “I, in no way, shape or form, am happy with where we are in the Special Victims Division.”
Detectives handing adult sex crimes took on an average of 54 cases per officer in 2019, a slight decrease from the average of 56 the year before, according to Rosenthal’s analysis of NYPD data.
That “is at least two or three times higher than what it should be,” she said.
Officers handling child abuse cases took on an average of 64 cases last year, down from 88 in 2018.
When Shea tried to put a positive spin on Rosenthal’s remarks, the councilwoman cut him off.
“Thank you for recognizing the shift downward of the caseload per investigator,” the city’s top cop said.
“I don’t want you to misunderstand what I’ve said,” the councilwoman shot back. “I’ve had this experience with you misunderstanding my trying to be polite and gracious.”
She initially calculated SVD detectives specializing in child abuse had 308 cases per officer in 2019, but revised the number after the hearing.
“They’re moving in the right direction: they went from despicable to very bad,” Rosenthal said.
Last year, the NYPD unveiled its “survivor-focused” approach to sex crime investigations. The Special Victims Division got more detectives and private rooms to conduct interviews in a new office in lower Manhattan.
Rosenthal said the efforts aren’t enough, criticizing SVD training as inadequate.
She calculated the NYPD offers just three weeks of training to prep officers for the division, and noted an astonishing 100% of officers pass the tests required to join SVD.
“Three weeks is not enough and what I’m hearing from experts ... is closer to 10 to 15 weeks,” Rosenthal said. “Remarkably, every single detective passed every single exam 100% in the first round, which is interesting to me. Wow.”
Shea promised to look into some of Rosenthal’s concerns.
“We are absolutely committed, if there is a problem with the caseload with the child investigations, we will move resources to correct it, absolutely,” he said.