City can publish NYPD discipline files, appeals court rules
New York City can publish police officers’ disciplinary records, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday — shooting down a lawsuit by law enforcement unions that sought to block the release.
The state legislature voted in June to repeal a law that kept police disciplinary files secret as part of a police reform push driven by protests after the death of George Floyd.
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court ruling to allow the release of the records, which also cover firefighters and correction officers.
Mayor Bill de Blasio announced plans to create a public, online database of police disciplinary records shortly after the law shielding those records from public view, known as 50-a, was repealed.
But unions representing police, fire and correction officers sued, arguing that their members would be harmed by the release of unsubstantiated complaints, and temporary court orders put a freeze on the disclosures.
The unions said that releasing the information would violate collective bargaining agreements and cause safety risks to police officers.
The panel of three judges rejected those claims.
“Many other States make similar misconduct records at least partially available to the public without any evidence of a resulting increase of danger to police officers,” the court wrote.
“We have considered the Unions’ remaining arguments and conclude that they are without merit.”
Some records have already become public after the New York Civil Liberties Union obtained a trove of complaints from the Civilian Complaint Review Board and published them in an online database once a court order blocking them was lifted.
“The rule of law prevailed today. The city’s planned release of these records was consistent with the law and the enhanced transparency the legislature intended. We are gratified by this court ruling,” said city Law Department spokesperson Nick Paolucci. He could not immediately say when the city would move forward with publishing the documents.
The coalition of unions did not say whether it would attempt to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. “We are determining options,” said spokesperson Hank Sheinkopf.
“Today’s ruling does not end our fight to protect our members’ safety and due process rights. The FOIL law provides exemptions that allow public employers to protect employees’ safety and privacy,” Sheinkopf said. “We will continue to fight to ensure that New York City applies those exemptions to our members fairly and consistently, as they do for other public employees.”
The advocacy group Communities United for Police Reform intervened in the case, saying the city was not mounting a strong enough defense of the law.
“Police unions have been trying to undermine and overturn the Legislature and the public will that led to the repeal of 50-a because they want to preserve police impunity and shield abusive officers from consequences,” said director Joo-Hyun Kang. “Today’s decision from the Second Circuit affirms that the public has the right to know when police brutalize or sexually harass New Yorkers and escape discipline, in spite of police unions’ baseless claims and fearmongering.”