NYPD Reassigning Hundreds of Plain Clothes Officers
DERMOT SHEA, NYC POLICE COMMISSIONER: -- how they're retired. Should we have them in raid jackets? Should we have them in uniform going back to last year? Those conversations have continued. Never pulled the plug on it but it was always in the back of my mind. I think that when you have this moment in time right now it was clear to me this week, this is not without risk, let me be clear. And the risk will fall squarely on my shoulders. I worry when I make this decision of unintended consequences. Do we recover less guns? But it's also how we recover the guns. It's what I'm asking my officers to do. And I have to protect the people that live in this city. I have to make sure that we build trust with the residents of this city. I also have to protect my cops. And I think this decision is the right decision and it's the right decision at this time, certainly.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And just to follow up. How many</s>SHEA: There are roughly about --</s>BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN HOST: All right. So the headline here from the New York Police Commissioner Dermot Shea is in the fact that really in the wake of everything we've been reporting on the couple of week and it sounds like what, you know, how policing has really moved into 21st century policing as he said. They will now be reassigning. He said there were 600 plain clothes officers known as the Anti-Crime Team, men and women in New York City streets, they'll be reassigning them, and this is significant. He referred to it as a seismic change for NYPD. So, let me bring in retired LAPD Police Sergeant Cheryl Dorsey. And so first explain to those of us, when we hear Anti-Crime Team, right, these men and women who will now reassigned, what exactly do they do and do you think this is a good decision on behalf of NYPD?</s>CHERYL DORSEY, RETIRED LAPD POLICE SERGEANT: So this is a unit much like what we have here in Los Angeles within our metropolitan division. These are the officers who are sometimes in uniform or plain clothes and they don't respond to radio calls for service. They do proactive pretext stops in the hopes of finding someone who may have a gun or have drugs. I call them elephant hunters. The big game hunters. The Billy Bad A, right. These are the ones who kick butt and take names and they jump out of cars anonymously in their plain clothes uniform and they rough people up and sometimes they get the wrong person and then they just drive off, my bad. Not even an apology, not even a business card. And so while this is a great first step, let's not get all beside ourselves here because this is the same Dermot Shea who said when he took office that, you know, the citizens of New York are going to respect his officers. I hear folks talking about doing everything, Brooke, except for that four-letter word, accountability. Why won't they just hold officers who misbehave accountable. Because I promise you as a patrol officer and a patrol supervisor for 20 years when officers in are in patrols see their peers sitting in a courtroom addressing murder charges, they'll conduct themselves differently. We can't even in the midst of protests stop officers from killing folks. You have 57 officers from the ERT on the Buffalo Police Department step down. Why? Because they were offended that two of their officers were fired and charged for shoving a 75-year-old man down and cracking his head open. So, until you change that mindset, we're going to continue to have this problem. And so, thank you Mr. Shea for moving the 600 Billy Bad butts but how about we hold officers accountable when we see them commit misconduct?</s>BALDWIN: Cheryl Dorsey, I appreciate your opinion and telling it like you see it. I thank you very much.</s>DORSEY: Thank you.</s>BALDWIN: So that's coming out of the NYPD. Meantime, Atlanta. We are expecting another news conference. This one down south. Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms will be speaking to reporters and we'll bring that for you live. Again, of course, this is on the wake of the Rayshard Brooks case. One of those police officers has been fired and the other is on administrative leave. We'll be right back.