NYC tries to limit right to record cops

Across the nation, masked ICE agents are terrorizing our neighbors, breaking into homes, and abducting families. Many community members and activists, rightfully horrified, have picked up their smartphones and their cameras to record what they witness.

Videos of ICE officers engaged in rampant misconduct show that the right to record is more essential than ever. But, shockingly, New York City is seeking to drastically limit the right to record in the New York State Court of Appeals.

After Police Officer Derek Chauvin murdered George Floyd in 2020 in Minneapolis, both the New York State Legislature and the New York City Council passed legislation designed to hold police more accountable, including by enshrining civilians’ rights to record law enforcement.

LatinoJustice represents SeanPaul Reyes, who was arrested for recording in the public lobby of an NYPD precinct in April 2023. Since the Right to Record Acts were passed, the NYPD has steadfastly maintained that they do not apply in NYPD precinct lobbies, spaces that are open to the public 24 hours a day.

The NYPD maintains that because lobbies are “NYPD property” it can make whatever rules it wants for them. It has relied on the rule against recording in precincts to conduct violent arrests, including of a 61-year old grandmother who had gone to the precinct requesting paperwork required by her insurance company.

New York City is backing the NYPD at the state Court of Appeals — arguing that whatever the Right to Record Acts say, they cannot prevent the NYPD from exercising its rights as a property owner over its precinct lobbies. If the court accepts this argument, the right to record will be drastically limited.

If the government can bar people from recording on government property, recording the police could be made illegal in the subways, on the steps of City Hall, or even in the city’s parks, which unlike NYPD lobbies are closed to the public at night.

Recording the actions of law enforcement has been instrumental to exposing police misconduct and holding officers accountable ever since George Holliday hoisted his new Sony Handycam onto his shoulder and recorded six police officers beating Rodney King in 1991.

Recently, the Department of Homeland Security falsely claimed that recording ICE agents is illegal and said that video recordings were “threats” that amounted to “doxxing. Using that spurious justification, ICE agents have detained, assaulted, and even — in the case of Minneapolis ICU nurse Alex Pretti — killed people for recording.

Activists will continue to record law enforcement whether or not the Court of Appeals agrees that the government can arrest people who record the police on government property. After all, it was illegal for Erik Crespo to turn on an MP3 player in 2007 and record Detective Christopher Perino’s unlawful interrogation, but he did it anyway. And three brave men who secretly recorded the brutal conditions in Alabama’s prisons have been punished with solitary confinement — even as the film they made has been nominated for an Oscar.

We feel confident that when the Court of Appeals hears our case in May, they will recognize that the Legislature meant what the bill’s lead sponsor, Assemblyman Nick Perry, said when he introduced it, that it protects “the right to monitor to the greatest extent… so long as you do not interfere with the police activity.”

At a time when masked secret police brutalize, kidnap, detain, and kill our neighbors, any retreat on the right to record law enforcement is unacceptable. LatinoJustice stands with the copwatchers and those who hold law enforcement accountable, and is ready to defend the right to record in court.

Case is senior counsel at LatinoJustice.