August 2, 2016, New York – In response to the resignation of Commissioner Bratton, Center for Constitutional Rights attorney Darius Charney made the following statement:

We hope and fully expect the change in leadership at the New York City Police Department will not in any way affect the department’s commitment to the court-ordered police reform process underway in our city. Commissioner Bratton leaves behind a complicated legacy: while he started the NYPD down the road to curbing its worst stop-and-frisk excesses and abuse, he is also the architect of broken windows policing, which has caused similar harms to many of the same communities.

Ultimately, what matters is not a change in who is at the top, but a change in culture at every level of the department. The court-appointed monitor wrote as much in his reporting to the judge in our case. We have several more years of court oversight of the NYPD’s implementation of  numerous stop-and-frisk reforms, as well as a  joint remedial process for the community to shape additional reforms. Only that cultural shift in the department will enable the NYPD to work together with the impacted communities, with police reform groups, with the plaintiffs in Floyd v. City of New York, and with the court and monitor to bring real reform that ensures the NYPD polices, protects, serves, and respects the rights of all communities in New York City.

In August 2013, the Center for Constitutional Rights won a landmark ruling that found the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk practices to be racially discriminatory and unconstitutional under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments.