SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP) - The New York Civil Liberties Union on Thursday filed a lawsuit against the city of Syracuse and its police department, saying it had been denied access to certain police misconduct complaints despite state law.
The NYCLU said it had turned in a request to the police department seeking the records in September, some months after the state Legislature passed a law that allowed officers’ records and misconduct complaints to be disclosed.
In its lawsuit, the NYCLU said the police department denied requests for police misconduct complaints that had not resulted in any disciplinary action, and the city later denied the organization’s appeal of that decision.
Bobby Hodgson, senior staff attorney at the NYCLU, said in a statement, “New Yorkers stood up, spoke out, and demanded change: the law is no longer on the side of police secrecy. Being able to compare when the SPD did impose discipline as the result of a complaint against when and why it did not is vital to vindicating the public’s right to complete information about the police misconduct that takes place in their communities.”
An email and a telephone message seeking comment were left with the city’s law department.
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