Memo: NYPD Oversight Investigators' Job Has Become "Untenable" Because Of Body Cam Backlog

The agency tasked with investigating police misconduct in New York City faces an "untenable" situation due to a "struggle for access" to body camera footage from interaction with officers, according to a memo top investigators sent to senior staff.

As of June 26th, the NYPD hasn't given responses to 1,137 requests for body camera videos, impacting 1,032 complaints against cops, the internal memo within the Civilian Complaint Review Board reads.

At least 40 percent are more than 90 days old—a percentage that has risen in recent months, data shows.

"The situation is untenable," two deputy chiefs in the investigations division, Olas Carayannis and Dane Buchanan, wrote to senior staff June 26th. "The struggle for access to [body worn cameras] is the struggle for the future of civilian oversight. In this era of rightfully increased scrutiny of police accountability, we urge the Agency to seize this moment to do everything in its power to obtain unmediated direct access to BWC footage."

"The BWC program, established as a result of the Floyd litigation as a measure to oversee the police, has at once produced extraordinarily reliable evidence for civilian oversight investigations and has also perversely empowered the NYPD to control the pace of said investigations," they wrote. "BWC is readily and easily used against members of the public, being immediately electronically linked to an arrest report for the easier prosecution of civilian crimes, but the situation for New York City oversight of police has steadily grown worse during the duration of a BWC program intended primarily to aid oversight."

The CCRB confirmed the memo was sent to senior staff.

"The Board and staff have long believed there should be unfettered access to body-worn camera footage, and I share their concern about the backlog," CCRB Chair Fred Davie said in a statement. "We have been working on obtaining direct access, and we are making inroads on the backlog."

"As we have seen in recent weeks with the influx of police misconduct allegations, direct access is a necessary tool for the CCRB to fairly and impartially investigate these matters as efficiently as possible," Davie said.

Last November, the NYPD agreed to provide the body camera footage to the board within 10 to 25 days through a process requiring an investigator to review unedited footage with an NYPD employee inside a secure room. Cases in which officers kill or seriously injure someone won't be available for CCRB investigators to review until the NYPD finishes its investigation under that memorandum of understanding. Officers are also able to review the footage before an interview can be scheduled. CCRB spokesperson Ethan Teicher said the COVID-19 pandemic has affected implementing the agreement, and that the backlog would not be happening if the agreement was operational.

Last summer, more than one-third of complaints with body camera footage requests were unfulfilled.

Since then, it appears not much has changed for investigators trying to access the footage.

Pending requests for body camera footage have risen from 661 to 983 between March and May 2020. The percentage of requests more than 90 days old rose from 12 percent to 43 percent in that time period.

In May alone, the board asked for body cam footage in 212 cases and got 33 responses, according to the memo.

"I'm not surprised," said Jennvine Wong, a staff attorney with the Legal Aid Society's Cop Accountability Project. "It is just another example of how the body worn camera system was supposed to be this harbinger for accountability, and here in New York City and here with the NYPD, it just hasn't."

In New Orleans and San Francisco, police oversight agencies have direct access to the body worn camera footage, which launched in New York City in April 2017. As protests continued in NYC, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the NYPD would have to turn over body camera footage within 30 days in some circumstances, like when a cop shoots a gun, discharges a Taser, or uses force that seriously injures or kills someone. But that announcement didn't address CCRB's access to body cameras.

"It seems like a small thing, but it's also just something that has been ongoing," said Wong, saying amid demands to reduce the NYPD's budget, it begs the question of why the system is being funded by the NYPD if it's used in a way that hampers accountability. "It's not a hard solution if you ask me. You just give direct access to the CCRB."

NYPD spokesperson Jessica McRorie said the department "recognizes the importance of producing body worn camera footage in a timely manner and is working with CCRB to produce recent protest-related videos expeditiously." It completed 180 case requests, amounting to 703 videos, in two weeks.

"Over the past several months, the people of New York City have experienced unprecedented events and challenges, including the COVID-19 pandemic," McRorie added in an emailed statement. "In response to these challenges, and to ensure public safety, the NYPD undertook a reallocation of resources which deployed many officers into the field and away from administrative assignments."

Mass demonstrations in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis where cops in riot gear beat, pepper-sprayed, and shoved marchers, in come cases badly injuring them, have spurred an influx of CCRB complaints.

More than 750 complaints have been filed in relation to the protests, which began May 28th.

More than 210 investigations are underway, the CCRB said.

In addition to CCRB investigations in protest-related misconduct, the NYPD's Internal Affairs Bureau has disciplined a handful of officers due to conduct during protests. The New York State Attorney General Letitia James as well as the city's Corporation Counsel and Department of Investigation are leading other investigations.

The deputy chiefs blame some of the backlog on the pandemic, but restrictions to accessing footage have curtailed their work. With direct access, investigators "would have been able to successfully retrieve the video relevant to these hundreds of complaints," the memo says.

Also during the pandemic, police unions have declined to allow officers to be questioned remotely, THE CITY reported in early June. The CCRB said police officers are now being interviewed by video, but did not provide details about how.

"In the event of any other future external circumstances that might force New York City government employees to work from home much of the time, including a second wave of COVID-19, direct access to the NYPD BWC database will be one of the only ways for those experiencing police misconduct to see timely justice," the memo says.

The CCRB spokesperson added that "efforts to obtain protest footage quickly may result in changes to the process that will help resolve the situation" regarding the backlog.

The memo—sent to senior staff from Deputy Chief of Special Operations Olas Carayannis and Deputy Chief of Investigations Dane Buchanan on June 26th with the subject line “BWC Landscape”—reads as follows:

As of June 26, 2020, the NYPD has not provided any responses to 1137 requests for Body Worn Camera footage affecting 1032 complaints against NYPD MOS in the CCRB’s jurisdiction (see the enclosed spreadsheet for details). At least 40% of these requests are over 90 days old. On June 3, 2020, this number was 907. In the intervening days, through negotiations with the NYPD, 129 responses have been received relating to the most recent protest cases and yet the number of outstanding requests has outstripped the rate at which the NYPD has been responsive, with the number hovering somewhere near the 1100 from day-to-day.

On February 27, 2020, the CCRB issued a report regarding the impact of Body Worn Camera on CCRB Investigations, declaring that they are absolutely pivotal to coming to a disposition on the merits for allegations of misconduct. Officers, who have ready access and a Patrol Guide mandate to be allowed to view their own footage prior to any CCRB interview, cannot be interviewed without the investigator being given access to these videos. The withholding of BWC footage stops investigations and prevents the CCRB from providing adequate and meaningful oversight of the NYPD. The BWC program, established as a result of the Floyd litigation as a measure to oversee the police, has at once produced extraordinarily reliable evidence for civilian oversight investigations and has also perversely empowered the NYPD to control the pace of said investigations.

BWC footage is readily and easily used against members of the public, being immediately electronically linked to an arrest report for the easier prosecution of civilian crimes, but the situation for New York City oversight of police has steadily grown worse during the duration of a BWC program intended primarily to aid oversight.

While the pandemic bears some blame for the backlog, CCRB Investigators have been assiduously working throughout the period and with direct access to the BWC database would have been able to successfully retrieve the video relevant to these hundreds of complaints. Instead, in the month of May they requested BWC in 212 cases and, received 33 responses. In the event of any other future external circumstances that might force New York City government employees to work from home much of the time, including a second wave of COVID-19, direct access to the NYPD BWC database will be one of the only ways for those experiencing police misconduct to see timely justice.

The situation is untenable. The struggle for access to BWC is the struggle for the future of civilian oversight. In this era of rightfully increased scrutiny of police accountability, we urge the Agency to seize this moment to do everything in its power to obtain unmediated direct access to BWC footage.