A New Balance: Weighing Harms of Hiding Police Misconduct Information from the Public

Three New York City events in the past two years have demonstrated how hiding information related to police misconduct harms its residents. In April 2016, the New York Police Department (“NYPD”) eliminated public access to misconduct information by taking down a clipboard in the Deputy Commissioner of Public Information’s office that posted disciplinary summaries and removing decades worth of archives of those same summaries from City Hall. In September 2017, an Administrative Law Judge employed by the NYPD closed from the public a courtroom where a former officer was about to be impeached with his prior disciplinary record. In April 2018, four plainclothes police officers shot Mr. Saheed Vassell dead in broad daylight.

The Mayor and Police Commissioner never named these officers, while the NYPD aggressively sought to manipulate public opinion towards a conclusion that the officers’ shooting was justified and more generally that NYPD officers are restrained in using violence against unarmed civilians. This article argues that police privacy protections enacted in state statutes across the country cause greater harm to individuals, public trust in justice systems, and democratic decision-making than access to police misconduct information harms individual police officers. People harmed by hiding police officer misconduct include families who lost loved ones to police violence, communities uncertain if dangerous officers are still a threat, and everyone who witnesses how impossible it seems to hold officers accountable. These harms spread across cities and states and are passed down through generations.

Previously prioritized police privacy concerns will be examined closely and weighed carefully in relation to the actual harms they can cause. A new balance will conclude that the harms caused by police privacy protections to the public significantly outweigh transparency’s potential harm to police officers’ privacy.