The NYPD has reportedly decided to stop policing unless its absolutely necessary as part of their misguided protest in the wake of two officers being murdered in Brooklyn earlier this month. Officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu were killed by Ismaaiyl Brinsley while seated in their police cruiser on Dec. 20.
Both the New York Daily News and the New York Post point to a significant drop in arrests beginning the week after Ramos and Liu were killed:
It has helped contribute to a nose dive in low-level policing, with overall arrests down 66 percent for the week starting Dec. 22 compared with the same period in 2013, stats show.
Citations for traffic violations fell by 94 percent, from 10,069 to 587, during that time frame.
Summonses for low-level offenses like public drinking and urination also plunged 94 percent — from 4,831 to 300.
Even parking violations are way down, dropping by 92 percent, from 14,699 to 1,241. Drug arrests by cops assigned to the NYPD’s Organized Crime Control Bureau — which are part of the overall number — dropped by 84 percent, from 382 to 63.
The Daily News adds that transit arrests have taken a dive from "662 to 20 and housing arrests dropped from 258 to 65" over last year. Worse, the Daily News claims that the two districts where Ramos and Liu worked—the 84th and the 79th—managed to make one lonely arrest between them last week.
Furthermore, the Post reports that a concern for officers' safety and anger with New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio are the reasons for this dramatic decline in police work:
The call last week from the PBA is what started it, but this has been simmering for a long time, one source said.
This is not a slowdown for slowdown’s sake. Cops are concerned, after the reaction from City Hall on the Garner case, about de Blasio not backing them.
De Blasio, the ire of police across the city, will reportedly meet police unions across the city today to try and rectify this mess.
[via New York Post and New York Daily News]
