DIRTY DIGGING
Suit: Cops illegally use sealed case records
YOUR PERMANENT record is not a myth.
Cops are using and sharing sealed arrest records illegally allowing them to level harsher penalties against New Yorkers — especially on minorities, according to a bombshell lawsuit filed Tuesday in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Despite a state law requiring the NYPD to destroy all records — including fingerprints, mugshots and arrest reports — if the suspect is found not guilty or the charges are dropped, police keep the records and use them to investigate and charge people, according to the suit.
A Wappingers Falls man, identified in the lawsuit only by the initials R.C., says he fell victim to this unlawful police policy when he was rousted from his sleep at his mother’s home in 2015 by detectives accusing him of an armed robbery.
Though the man was in Danbury, Conn., at the time of the crime, a witness picked out his mugshot from a sealed arrest because he fit the description of the one of the gunmen — a white Hispanic male, 15 to 19 with black hair, according to court records.
The charges were dismissed in November 2016, but not before R.C. lost his job and was forced to give up his college plans after a year of court dates, he said in the suit.
The only way police can access sealed records is by getting a court order, but a series of interconnected NYPD databases allow them routine access, the lawsuit, which seeks class-action status, charges.
Prosecutors, armed with wrongly disclosed info, also could use it during criminal proceedings — putting arrestees at a life-altering unfair disadvantage.
Criminal discovery, which could include the fact that the arrest was based on unlawfully accessed records, is often not shared with defense lawyer until months into the case, litigators claim.
“In many cases, individuals may accept plea agreements without any knowledge that the prosecution’s plea offer may have been shaped by the NYPD’s unlawful disclosure of sealed arrest information,” the suit says.
Civil rights lawyers lauded the suit, saying it’s been an issue in the criminal justice system for a while.
“It’s a widespread problem,” said Darius Charney, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights. “Hopefully, it’s going to bring about changes that are long overdue to NYPD practice.”
The policy affects even lowlevel crime.
Sealed turnstile jumping charges, even if they don’t lead to a conviction, could label a straphanger a “transit recidivist.”
Under that mandatory arrest policy, cops wind up arresting people using information from those sealed arrests “who otherwise would be subject only to civil consequences,” according to the lawsuit.
“Because black and Latino people are disproportionately targeted for arrests, they have a disproportionate share of sealed arrests,” lawyers for the plaintiff charge.
The city Law Department said it was reviewing the suit.