A specialized khaki-clad police unit spun up by NYPD leadership in 2022 ostensibly to address "quality of life" concerns frequently conducts unlawful stops and searches of Black and Hispanic motorists, the federal court monitor overseeing the NYPD's stop-and-frisk practices reported Tuesday.
The Community Response Team was originally created in 2022 by then-Chief of Department Jeff Maddrey, then-Chief of Patrol John Chell, and then-Detective Kaz Daughtry. The initial reason given for the creation of the unit was to address "quality of life" complaints arising from such things as dirt bikes and illegal motorcycles.
Though the formation of the unit was initially a closely-held secret, it enjoyed the endorsement and protection of Mayor Adams himself, and soon the department was sending out sizzle-reels of its high-octane enforcement actions.
When the monitor initially asked the NYPD about the CRT, the department told the monitor that it was "a pilot program that had ceased operations," according to the report. In fact, the monitoring team learned that CRTs were not only still going, they were operating out of patrol boroughs across the city.
CRT cops aren't, in the main, responding to 911 calls for crimes in progress, or to 311 calls for quality-of-life issues. They're going around stopping and searching New Yorkers on their own initiative: 96 percent of the stops they conducted in the third quarter of last year were self-initiated, according to the report.
That fits in with the style of policing favored by Mayor Eric Adams and his police leadership. Other units, including the Public Safety Teams and the Neighborhood Safety Teams, revived and renamed under Adams, also spend a lot of their time stopping and searching people. (The monitor has already investigated and found that these teams, too, have unacceptably high rates of unconstitutional stops and searches.)