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Comment by throwawaysea | Hacker News Reader

It’s hard to say if this data is telling us anything notable. It seems like 11% of the NYPD has had at least one claim against them substantiated. But isn’t that to be expected? Each officer probably has on the order of a thousand interactions with citizens each year on the low end. Over a ten year period, wouldn’t even a high performing nearly perfect officer violate some rule within their complex policing guidelines just because they are imperfect humans, as we all are? Many of those violations are also likely minor and not material as far as constructing an anti police narrative.

The article notes that only 303 of 36000 officers (0.8%) have 5 or more substantiated violations against them. The particulars of those should be examined more closely perhaps, but overall I’m not taking this as a sign of things being irrevocably broken. It even suggests that minor tweaks (reforms) would work, as they have elsewhere like in Seattle.

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If you think these numbers are anything other than the tip of the iceberg you're incredibly naive. Consider how many victims of police violence have the means to make a complaint to the CCRB. The fact that these complaints (to this point) have almost never resulted in the firing or disciplining of violent officers makes filing the complaint itself mostly pointless. Add to that the fear of retribution from the NYPD, who have your address and have already made you a victim, and it's shocking that there are this many on file.

> "Thirty-four officers have had 40 or more allegations against them."

That's 34 people who should be off the streets - so that's notable.

It would also be interesting to find the count of claims where the board was unable to get evidence it was entitled to.

Could be the same complainant with a grudge on a particular beat. Likely not but blanket statements like yours aren't helpful.

You can pontificate that its one rogue complainant or you can check the data because its right there and shows race, age and gender of the complainant. The very first page of data shows one sergeant with 25 complaints composed of atleast 11 complainants over 5 years.

Well, you've agreed that's not likely, so how exactly is your statement helpful? Why are you dragging the conversation to center around possibilities that even you don't believe in?

As long as there's zero accountability or transparency, there will always be the remote possibility that there are good cops out there being complained against, but that should be an argument for greater accountability and transparency, not for assuming the best and waiting for the next time a police officer murders someone on camera to do the same thing again.

I would imagine if I did anything at my workplace that these cops get complaints for, I would get fired instantly, even if the complainant wasn't able to substantiate it.

You probably don't have a union.

If a union protects a coworker that has verbally abused me that finally escalated to a physical altercation, then the union is useless.

If the coworker is part of the union and you aren't, then the union has fine its job.

The issue is that I think most of us agree when it gets to the level you describe, perhaps that's not a job worth doing.

It's easy to see how it gets to that point though. Friends in the union might not care who is in the wrong, and selective retelling of the facts can get other union member up in arms about the "raw deal" their fellow member is getting, so it's probably easier for the union to just protect all but the most egregious behavior against non union people. I imagine that's just how the incentives work out.

The problem with police unions isn't that they are unions.

The problem is that in addition to representing the line workers, the union also manages the entire department. It controls everything except setting the department's budget.

It would be like the C-executives of GM being part of the United Auto Workers union. There would be zero accountability for anyone, and the interests of the shareholders would not be represented well.

Unions must exist in an adversarial relationship with management - it keeps all parties honest. If the union takes over management, you get a disaster.

I agree with you but I also think there's a problem with police in unions. I find it unethical, and it's clearly not working, for a government entity approved to inflict violence on a population to organize and ensure the violence can happen without any accountability. The government needs complete and total control over police to fire and discipline them as needed when they're literally murdering people. It is not reasonable to allow a group of citizens the ability the deny basic law enforcement over union disputes.

So you're saying we need a second military. I'm not on board with that.

If that were true, it would be in their interests to publish and promote data that contradicted the image of a force of violent goons.

What data could contradict such an image?

Generally, data doesn’t convince anyone who doesn’t want to be convinced, and can usually be used to support a wide variety of contradictory interpretations.

Avoiding this is why science has to be so rigorous.

I would be more convinced by a solid trail of data of this committee getting full cooperation from the NYPD.

I’m not sure we’ll get to absolute confidence. But at least knowing we have a complete data set and sound, valid process.

The absence of such cooperation is sufficient evidence of systematic disregard for the law, and q systematic disregard for the law seems like a good enough reason to wholesale replace a governmental system.

Except the data substantiates the image of a force of violent goons

> Each officer probably has on the order of a thousand interactions with citizens each year on the low end. Over a ten year period, wouldn’t even a high performing nearly perfect officer violate some rule within their complex policing guidelines just because they are imperfect humans, as we all are?

No, this narrative is disgusting. People don't punch people in the face, choke them, hit them with nightsticks, spray them with tear gas and pepper spray, shoot them with rubber bullets, and fucking murder people, because they're "imperfect humans, as we all are". You wouldn't cut anyone else this kind of slack, stop putting police officers above the rest of us.

People don't report officers because they "violate some rule within their complex policing guidelines", for the simple reason that people don't know all the complex policing guidelines. People report officers because they do stuff that is obviously illegal (or should be).

What's unexpected here are how few officers have received any sort of disciplinary action.

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