Brooklyn Police Supervisor Pressed Ticket Quotas: Report

A secret recording made in a Brooklyn police station reportedly caught supervisors discussing ticket quotas with one top commander tellings others they'd be reprimanded -- even fired -- unless their precincts met the numbers.

The New York Times says it got the hourlong recording, made by a police supervisor, this week. It says the recording was made during an April meeting of supervisors from the 81st Precinct.
       
The Police Department did not respond to repeated requests for comment from the Times.

The recording indicates a police captain warned top commanders that their officers must start writing more summonses or face consequences, according to the Times.

"They’re counting seat belts and cellphones; they’re counting double parkers and bus stops," Captain Alex Perez said in the recording obtained by the Times. "If day tours contributed with five seat belts and five cellphones a week, five double-parkers and five bus stops a week, O.K ... You as bosses, have to demand this and have to count it."

"Your goal is five in each of these categories, not a difficult task to accomplish on Monday,” Perez added. “If it’s not accomplished by Monday, you’ve got to follow up with it on Tuesday. But there’s no reason it can’t be done by Thursday. So whatever I get by Friday, Saturday, Sunday is gravy. I’m not looking to break records here, but there is no reason we should be losing this number by 30 a week."

The phrase "losing by 30" apparently makes reference to lower numbers computed in CompStat, which tracks low-level summonses in the department, according to the Times. Perez pressed top commanders to bring that number back up, the paper reports. 

In the recording, Perez apparently told officers that those who didn't deliver would be relegated to opposite shifts -- midnight to day and vice versa -- regardless of their familial responsibilities.

“I don’t care about people’s families, if they don’t want to do their job,” he said. “Their paycheck is taking care of their family. If they don’t realize that, they’re going to change their tour; they’re going to start being productive if they want a tour that works for their family.”

If they still didn't meet expectations, Perez explained, he would give underproducing officers lower reviews and wage a campaign to get them fired, according to the tape obtained by the Times.

"I really don’t have a problem firing people," he said. "I don’t need to carry you. So that’s the attitude that you’ve got to sell to the cops."