Queens DA Richard Brown's Report on Whistleblower Cop Raises More Questions Than It Answers

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2012/12/nypd_tapes_upda.php




Queens District Attorney Richard Brown's announcement last week that neither the police nor Jamaica Hospital committed any crimes when NYPD Tapes whistleblower Adrian Schoolcraft was dragged from his apartment by police and involuntarily held in a psych ward raises a whole lot more questions than it answers.
Schoolcraft's father, Larry, and their lawyer blasted the announcement as "a violation of the public trust," and "deeply disappointing."

Schoolcraft, a police officer assigned to Bed-Stuy's 81st Precinct, is known for secretly recording his colleagues over two years in an effort to build evidence of misconduct. (See the Voice's award-winning NYPD Tapes series.) On Oct. 31, 2009, a deputy chief and a dozen police forced him out of his apartment in handcuffs and put him in the Jamaica Hospital psychiatric ward for six days--three weeks after he had made misconduct allegations against his bosses. In 2010, he filed a federal lawsuit alleging that police had retaliated against him for making those allegations.

While the NYPD painted Schoolcraft as a malcontent with psychological issues, and therefore, unreliable, an internal police investigation proved most of his claims. The NYPD buried that blockbuster report for more than 18 months. Its conclusions finally surfaced exclusively in the Voice.

Brown concludes in a terse one-page statement on his investigation, which he called "comprehensive": "After thoroughly reviewing all of the available evidence and considering all applicable provisions of law we have concluded that there is no credible evidence to support the filing of criminal charges in this matter."