CHOKEHOLD CHANGE
DeB eyes revision of new ban amid surge in NYC shootings
Mayor de Blasio supports amending the city’s new chokehold ban, to provide cops with clearer guidance and help address the city’s surge in shootings.
“I think there have been honest questions and concerns about what police officers can and cannot do, and we need our police officers to have clear instruction,” de Blasio said Thursday. “There’s a growing recognition a better balance needs to be struck so we can continue the work of reform but also make sure we’re fighting back against this horrible gun violence we’re seeing.”
The City Council is looking to tweak a law that was signed by the mayor last month after NYPD officials and unions said the ban makes it more dangerous for officers to do their jobs, sources told The Post. The changes would affect the part of the law that makes it a crime for an officer to apply pressure to someone’s diaphragm.
The revisions would come as arrests have plummeted by nearly half while shootings have almost doubled, suggesting cops may be participating in an unofficial work slowdown to protest the reforms.
Council Speaker Corey Johnson insisted on Thursday the amendment was not related to an NYPD slowdown. “I don’t think these things are connected in any way,”
Johnson said. “I wouldn’t link action the council took on a chokehold law and connect it to gun violence.”
But Councilman Donovan Richards (D-Queens), the Public Safety Committee chair who’s leading the effort to change the bill, said an NYPD slowdown has “absolutely” contributed to the crime spike.
“I do believe there seems to be a slowdown because of the diaphragm portion of the bill. Based on the science and what I’m seeing on the ground, there’s a slowdown,” Richards said.
He said the changes are meant to push the cops back into action.
“They should get back to work. They better,” he said.
Police unions say they’ll accept nothing short of a full repeal.
“That won’t happen, because the mayor and City Council have no intention of actually fixing this problem,” Police Benevolent Association president Patrick Lynch said Wednesday.
“They are content to blame cops for the mess they created. If they wanted us to be able to do our job safely and effectively, they would never have passed it in the first place.”
Backers of the original bill are also unhappy with the proposed changes.
“The chokehold law passed 47-3, was signed by the mayor just last month, and there hasn’t been a single example of an officer being unfairly prosecuted or unable to arrest a suspect,” Councilman Rory Lancman (D-Queens) said in a statement.
“So if as reported the positional asphyxiation part of the bill is amended to require a showing of recklessness and physical injury when, contrary to NYPD Patrol Guide guidance, an officer sits, kneels or stands on a suspect’s chest or back in a manner that compresses the diaphragm, in order to appease a police-union work slowdown, it will eviscerate not just the law itself, but the rule of law and the legitimacy of the City Council as an institution capable of overseeing the NYPD,” Lancman said.