A slew of NYPD officers recounted on Sunday horror stories from their careers in which they say they were falsely accused of sexual misconduct and, despite being exonerated, had the allegations shared to the public by the Civilian Complaint Review Board (CCRB), damaging their reputations and personal lives.
This comes after the Police Benevolent Association, the largest uniformed union in the Big Apple, announced it was suing the CCRB for releasing unsubstantiated allegations to third-party websites such as 50-a.org, a database that allows the public to search for officers’ names and view their alleged misconduct records.
According to cops who sat down with amNewYork under the promise of anonymity, they support police accountability and oversight if the allegation is proven. However, they say that their lives were negatively impacted because a person they arrested made a false allegation of sexual misconduct that was shared to 50-a.org.
One seasoned police officer who works in northern Manhattan shared that after making an arrest and working with an EMT to transport a woman to the hospital for a psychological evaluation, the emotionally distressed female began claiming that he had groped her and even raped her after he told her to stop acting erratically. According to the cop, she even threatened him, stating, “I am going to mess up your career.”
She continued the assault allegations even when she arrived at the hospital, repeating the claims to doctors and nurses.
“I couldn’t believe what the hell I was hearing. It was horrific. She was yelling at nurses and doctors. The doctors were really disturbed. They obviously made complaints, rightfully, to internal affairs. Internal Affairs called the precinct. The precinct called what they call a duty captain,” the cop recalled. “I’m scared not just of the dread of what’s to come in the sense that I’m going to have to field this complaint — I’m not even thinking that there’s going to be some 50-a entry later on in my career, that’s not even on my mind. I’m thinking about literal arrests and insane things that can happen based on adamant allegations.”
Once his supervisor sat down with him, she told him that the woman had rescinded her claims and admitted she was agitated by the way he had spoken to her and had made up the allegations. Still, the assertions continued to appear on his 50-a profile, without making it clear that the incident had been recanted. The officer said he didn’t even realize this sexual misconduct claim was on his profile until a year later, when he was assigned to monitor a protest. Demonstrators who looked up his name and badge number on 50–a.org and immediately came across the allegation, but did not see that it had been rescinded.
“So, somebody gets my history, my badge number, and they start screaming out and calling me a rapist. All this type of sexual stuff,” the Manhattan cop remembered. “I didn’t even remember the incident.”
The cop added that the harassment at the protest could have caused a riot and put other police officers in danger. Another cop, this time working out of Brooklyn, said he had a similar incident he worries could hurt his chance at a promotion down the line. During a traffic stop arrest, he said he was patting down a suspect to ensure he was not carrying any weapons when his hand accidentally came in contact with his genitals. The man later launched a sexual misconduct claim.
“If you Google my name plus NYPD, it’s going to come up, and the first thing they’re going to see is sexual misconduct, inappropriate touching. You know, it’s almost hurtful. I’d like to think I serve with honor. I serve with pride,” the Brooklyn officer said, adding that he believes these kinds of false allegations are causing cops to leave the department. “What drives people away from this job is the quality of life and having to come to work and worry about being second-guessed by CCRB. The number of cops that are getting from the CCRB over something that you know would have never affected their careers ten years ago.”
amNewYork reached out to the PBA President Patrick Hendry after the officers came forward. Hendry echoed the officers’ feelings, doubling down on the impact of these public, alleged, unsubstantiated allegations on police retention.
“CCRB is a completely illegitimate organization that is not only destroying cops’ lives and careers — they’re derailing public safety in this city, as well. Too many cops are leaving the NYPD because they don’t want to risk having their future employment prospects or personal relationships ruined by the patently false allegations CCRB is funneling to anti-police activists. That’s why we’re asking the court to take action to protect our members’ basic due process rights,” Hendry charged.
In response, Dakota Gardner, spokesperson for the Civilian Complaint Review Board, said the CCRB is committed to impartiality.
“The CCRB’s investigations are complete, thorough and impartial. The agency continually reviews all applicable laws and regulations regarding the public release of its records, including disciplinary histories of members of service, to ensure it is fully compliant. As this is now the subject of litigation, we cannot comment further at this time,” Gardner said.
Another Manhattan cop, this one working out of the southern section of the borough, told amNewYork that he is not just concerned about the impact these false claims could have on his career as a police officer or even post-law-enforcement, but also on his personal life and his family.
“It directly affected me, because my niece, her boyfriend, ended up doing an essay in college, and he ended up going into 50-a, and he saw it, and they asked me about it, and I had to explain, I didn’t do anything. I was just doing my job, and this lady made an allegation,” the cop said. “I have to explain myself to people.”
This cop said he was arresting a highly intoxicated woman after she flashed people at a bar when she made the allegations that he had inappropriately touched her.
“I had to explain it to my wife, you know, like, explain everything to her. It’s just a very uncomfortable feeling. My kids one day, my kids one day, will go on there, look it up, and they’ll see that,” he said.
According to the PBA, these three officers are among hundreds of cops who have faced similar situations, with the union stating that it has identified more than 1,300 false/unproven allegations (some officers have multiple) in this category published by 50-a.org.
