Nix Grand Juries In NYPD Misconduct Cases, Panel Tells Mayor

NEW YORK, NY — Grand juries should no longer be tasked with determining whether police face criminal misconduct charges, a panel of social justice experts has told Mayor Eric Adams.

Adams revealed Monday 81 recommendations for a more equitable city he received from the Social Justice Commission, which argued secretive grand juries create distrust when used in cases against cops.

This was among more than a dozen recommendations in the report surrounding the NYPD and criminal justice system.

"There’s an opportunity here…to seize the moment and put together public safety and social justice for the City of New York," civil rights attorney Norman Siegel said of the report.

Adams signed an Executive Order based on one report recommendation — reinforcing city agencies’ obligations to share information with the public — and said more action may follow.

"We're going to look at all of the recommendations and we will respond to each one of them," Adams said. "I'm going to read through it."

Grand juries in police misconduct cases — in which indictments are rare — came under renewed scrutiny during the reckoning on police brutality in 2020, specifically when one of the proceedings failed to bring charges against the officers in the killing of Breonna Taylor.

Reports have found that grand juries likely don't bring indictments against cops given the bias of both jurors and prosecutors toward police and lack of evidence.

The social justice panel — led by attorneys, advocates, professors and a retired New York Supreme Court justice — noted that grand juries were first created to "prevent oppressive prosecutions by the King."

They also pointed to the fact that grand juries do not include cross-examination from opposing counsel or legal rulings from a judge and that they are done in secret.

"Secrecy leads to distrust, especially in cases involving allegations of police misconduct," the report reads.

Monday's 77-page social justice report also suggested the NYPD create an affirmative action program to address a lack of diversity, make their data more easily accessible to the public and are overseen in misconduct cases by an independent special prosecutor.

The report, commissioned late last year, also included recommendations about the city's health system, Rikers Island, the 311 complaint database, a lack of green space in underserved areas and the process used to approve land use projects known as ULURP.

Read the full Social Justice Report here.