Councilwoman Laurie Cumbo struggled through tears as NYPD officials explained their gang database tool.
New York, NY – New York City Council Majority Leader Laurie Cumbo broke down in tears during a public safety committee meeting on Wednesday, as NYPD officials described a database system they have established to help track and combat gang violence (video below).
The NYPD database is a tool used to help track the members of approximately 500 gangs and crews operating in the city, the New York Daily News reported.
“The database is a vital tool in keeping the city safe,” Chief of Detectives Dermot Shea explained to the committee. “When violence erupts between two groups, it is vital for us to know who might retaliate and who is likely to be targeted.”
Opponents of the Criminal Group Database have declared the system to be racist, due to the fact that 95 percent of the 17,600 people entered into the system are African American or Hispanic, the Juvenile Justice Information Exchange reported.
“Words like ‘takedown’ and ‘crews’ and to talk about our children that way,” Cumbo lamented, shaking her head. “It’s really, I mean, maybe just because I’m a new mom and I’m really hormonal, but it is terrifying to hear about our children in that way. To be referred to as ‘crews’ and ‘gangs’ and ‘takedowns,’ and I mean, it just…”
According to Chief Shea, the average age of those entered in the database is 27 years old – nearly a decade older than the “children” Cumbo expressed being concerned about.
“The words we use, the language we use,” Cumbo continued through tears, according to the Juvenile Justice Information Exchange. “To hear us talk about them like this. To talk about them like numbers in a database.”
“They are people,” she said, according to the New York Daily News. “They are our community. They’re valuable. We can’t continue to look at people as casualties.”
Chief Shea noted that law enforcement used the same process to successfully topple Italian-American organized crime rings in the 1980s and 1990s.
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