A suburban New York police department regularly violated civil rights by making illegal arrests and conducting illegal strip and cavity searches, the Department of Justice said in a new report.
The report, released Thursday, identified that the Mount Vernon Police Department used excessive force in numerous ways, including by unnecessarily escalating minor encounters and overusing tasers and closed-fist strikes, particularly against people who were already on the ground, controlled by multiple officers or already restrained.
It also identified concerns with how the police department conducted vehicle stops and collected evidence, and noted concerns over discriminatory policing. The police department was also cited for making arrests without probable cause.
No single incident sparked the investigation into Mount Vernon's police force, although the illegal 2020 strip search of two elderly women — ages 65 and 75 respectively — was emblematic of the department's civil rights violations, the report said.
The two women were arrested on suspicion of purchasing drugs, the report said. Officers found no evidence of a crime during a search of their car, but still took them into custody and transported them to a police station in handcuffs.
Supervisors at the station approved a fully nude strip search by detectives who "told them to bend over and cough," according to the report.
An internal investigation determined that the officers had lied about the women purchasing drugs and, as a form of discipline, the officers involved were docked a few vacation days.
"Our investigation has found reasonable cause to believe that MVPD engages in a pattern or practice of conduct that violates the constitutional rights of the citizens it has sworn to protect," U.S. Attorney Damian Williams for the Southern District of New York said, in part, in a statement.
Mount Vernon's police force held a practice until at least the fall of 2022 to strip search every person placed under arrest, according to the report.
Officers also strip-searched people they did not place under arrest, and detained and interrogated people without formally arresting them.
People were also arrested for verbally criticizing officers, which is protected under the right to freedom of speech and expression.
The Justice Department said illegal strip and cavity searches continued until at least 2023. While the practice was "curtailed" during the probe, investigators said "we are not confident that these practices have ended."
"These unlawful searches were deeply ingrained in MVPD's practices, occurring over many years, and were highly intrusive, the report said.
The report identified cases of unconstitutional arrests, including an incident where officers transported the mother of a shooting victim to a police station and interrogated her while her daughter, who was struck by a stray bullet, was rushed to the hospital. The daughter died while her mother was in police custody. Officers failed to articulate any probable cause for the mother being held.
The police force also had financial mismanagement, which exacerbated pervasive human rights violations caused by illegal policies and lack of training, the DOJ said, adding that low salaries make it difficult to attract and retain quality officers, train staff and pay bills, which diminished its supply budget.
The Justice Department said the city is already taking steps to improve its policing practices. The report offered a series of recommendations, such as implementing measures "to ensure that unconstitutional strip and body cavity searches do not take place."
Mount Vernon Mayor Shawyn Patterson-Howard, a Democrat, said in a statement that the city would work with the Justice Department to address its findings of civil rights violations.
"We wholeheartedly support our good officers and at the same time will not tolerate and will punish unconstitutional policing," Patterson-Howard said.
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The mayor said three police officers and two civilian employees had been fired following an investigation in 2021 without providing details about when and why those individuals were fired.
Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the DOJ's Civil Rights Division said the investigation into MVPD "reveals a pattern and practice of unlawful conduct that can and must be addressed," adding that the department must implement measures to "end these unconstitutional practices."
"Police reform will not happen overnight," Clarke added. "Across the country, the department’s investigations, findings reports and resulting reform measures help law enforcement agencies become the departments that their citizens need and deserve."
The investigation into the Mount Vernon Police Department's pattern of officer misconduct is one of 12 probes opened by the DOJ into local policing agencies in the past three years.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
