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Edwin Raymond, NYPD officer: Department quotas dangerous

Edwin Raymond, the transit officer involved in a class-action lawsuit against the NYPD, said on Tuesday, March 1 that the pressure officers are under to make arrests is a dangerous practice.
Edwin Raymond, the transit officer involved in a class-action lawsuit against the NYPD, said on Tuesday, March 1 that the pressure officers are under to make arrests is a dangerous practice. Photo Credit: @abettertsq via Twitter

The transit officer involved in a class-action lawsuit against the NYPD said on Tuesday the pressure officers are under to make arrests is a dangerous practice.

Edwin Raymond, who has been an officer for eight years and was recently featured in a New York Times Magazine cover story about his fight to get promoted, said any community rapport is “completely undermined” by the need to make more and more arrests.

“In the last eight years, I’ve unfortunately witnessed this quota destroy lives,” Raymond said, speaking at a news conference organized by Justice League NYC in Bedford Stuyvesant. “When it comes to mass incarceration in New York City, the quota is at the root of it.”

Raymond said he would have been promoted to sergeant if he had only gone along with the unwritten policy, which he and others allege stems from the Stop-and-Frisk era. He, along with 11 other officers, are part of a class-action lawsuit that centers around the quotas the department allegedly forces officers to meet each month.

The NYPD did not respond to a request for comment. But according to reports, Police Commissioner Bill Bratton has called Raymond’s claims in The New York Times article “bull-[expletive].”

His attorney, Emeka Nwokoro, said Raymond doesn’t want to get into a “war of words” with Bratton, but was disappointed by the comment.

“I think that for Commissioner Bratton to use profanity in addressing the legitimate concerns of one of his employees is extremely disrespectful and shows a callous disregard for the conditions under which his police officers [work],” Nwokoro said, adding there have been ramifications. “It’s a very brave thing to do what he did and it comes with some negatives.”

Officer Adhyl Polanco, who currently works out of Brooklyn’s 94th Precinct and is also part of the suit, said it’s the most vulnerable people who get snagged in the alleged-quota system.

“When you put pressure on cops to come up with numbers, they’re not going to midtown Manhattan and choking somebody in the middle of the street,” Polanco said. “It’s the black, it’s the Hispanic, it’s the LGBT community. We go for the most vulnerable.”

Since the suit was filed, both Raymond and Polanco have said they’ve been retaliated against, but declined to elaborate.

Nwokoro, said the lawsuit isn’t just about one officer’s fight to get a promotion. It’s about the larger issue of discrimination.

“We are addressing the condition of the minority police officer,” Nwokoro said.