Public Hearings To Focus on the Shooting Deaths of Two New York City Police Offiers

I am pleased to announce that the New York State Senate will hold a series of public hearings convened by four Senate committees starting this month to examine police safety and public protection in New York City and throughout the state.

The hearings will review serious safety concerns raised by the shooting deaths of two NYPD Officers, Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu, in addition to other recent attacks and hostility directed at law enforcement.

Police officers put their lives on the line for New Yorkers, and have an extraordinarily difficult and dangerous job to do. It’s incumbent upon both the City and the State to give our law enforcement the support they need to ensure they’re always treated like the first-class professionals they are. By conducting these hearings, the State Senate is sending a clear and convincing signal that police officers should have every tool they need to promote public safety and protect and defend themselves. The hearings will be held in New York City and Albany and provide a thorough and balanced review of the City’s and State’s criminal justice systems. The Senators will receive input from law enforcement, legal scholars, City and State officials, and district attorneys on issues that include:

- The safety of police officers, in New York City and the rest of the state, in the current climate;

- Statistics on assaults upon police officers and discussions about adequate training and equipment and the risks the police must take while in the line of duty;

- The impact of community policing;

- The need for state action to assure adequate police disability and death benefits, impose stricter penalties and deny bail for people who assault police officers and/or make threats to the police, and provide increased treatment for criminals with mental illnesses, among other measures; and

- The grand jury process and procedure.

Please continue to visit my website for up-to-date information on this very important issue.