NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- The NYPD will shut down its "plainclothes" anti-crime units and move those officers to other assignments as part of an effort to "build trust" between police and the communities they serve, Commissioner Dermot Shea said Monday.
Approximately 600 precinct-level and Police Service Area-level plainclothes anti-crime officers will transition into other roles, "including detective bureau, neighborhood policing and other assignments," Shea said during a news conference Monday afternoon.
Plainclothes anti-crime officers are involved in a "disproportionate" number of shootings and garner a "disproportionate" number of complaints compared to other officers, he said, without providing exact statistics.
"There will continue to be plainclothes units in the NYPD, whether it's in surveillance teams, whether it's narcotics or things of that nature, but… historically, when you look, coming out of (George) Floyd… at the number of anti-crime officers that operate within New York City and you look at a disproportionate, quite frankly, proportion of complaints, shootings… again, I think we can do better," he said.
"We've shown that we can build prosecutable cases, with evidence, with intelligence, with video, and, make no mistake, we will need the cooperation of the five district attorneys… but we also have to do it with the communities that we serve," he went on to say. "We need cooperation, we need trust, and all of this goes into this decision."
"We must do it in a manner that builds trust between the officers and the community they serve," he added.
Shea called the decision a "seismic shift in the culture of how the NYPD polices this great city." The change will not affect transit anti-crime officers, he noted.
