WHITE PLAINS, NY –Westchester District Attorney Miriam E. Rocah announced today collaboration includes the FBI’s Westchester Safe Streets Task Force, the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, the Westchester Department of Public Safety, the Yonkers Police Department, the Mount Vernon Police Department, the New Rochelle Police Department and the Westchester District Attorney’s Office.
The announcement of New Rochelle’s involvement in a gang task force comes after years of denial by prominent New Rochelle municipal officials such as Mayor Noam Bramson and school officials such as every Superintendent and Board President since forever. The City of New Rochelle and New Rochelle Police Department have agreed to cooperate with federal, county, and local law enforcement partners to take on gang activity and gun violence.
“The City of New Rochelle is not immune to the issues of gang and gun violence, and their harmful impact upon our community,” New Rochelle Police Commissioner Robert Gazzola said. “The New Rochelle Police Department looks forward to collaborating with our local, county, and federal law enforcement partners to help address this issue and improve the quality of life for our citizens.”
At a press conference this afternoon, New Rochelle Police Captain J. Collins Coyne spoke for New Rochelle Police Deputy Commissioner Robert Gazzola. Coyne said New Rochelle has had a lot of shooting incidents and people with guns, including people with “ghost guns” without serial numbers.
Perhaps not understanding how New Rochelle is governed, Rocah credited weak-Mayor Noam Bramson of New Rochelle with committing NRPD to the new task force. Bramson has no authority under the City Charter to make any such commitment of police department resources, and has for years resisted admitting the obvious — that New Rochelle has gang activity and gang violence.
“The Police Commissioner and I agreed to participate in this program,” said Strome. “The Mayor did not authorize anything, and City Council authorization was not required.”
Credit new the police leadership and support from New Rochelle City Manager Charles B. Strome, not Mayor Bramson, who was not on-hand for the press conference.
The partnership between the New Rochelle Police Department and the Westchester County District Attorney’s Office comes weeks after New Rochelle PBA President Chris Greco lashed out at Rocah, accusing her of hunting cops and doxxing her. Greco put in for retirement after a series of articles by Talk of the Sound.
“This partnership at the federal, county and local level is exactly how law enforcement works best — collaboratively and proactively,” DA Rocah said. “Violent crime has dramatically spiked in other parts of the state, including New York City, and all of the partners in this initiative recognize the need to be proactive and prevent violent crime from escalating further here in Westchester. Every homicide due to gun or gang violence is one too many and every shooting makes entire communities feel vulnerable. That is why law enforcement in Westchester County is committed to conducting cooperative law enforcement operations to stop violent crime before it starts.”
The goal of this initiative is to prevent violent crime utilizing a precision policing and precision prosecution model targeting repeat violent offenders through short-term and long-term violent crime investigations. Together, we will focus on using all available investigable tools and techniques to build cases against violent offenders and their enablers. We will prosecute those cases at the State and Federal level, wherever it makes sense from a public safety standpoint of ending the violence.
The DA’s office expressed appreciation for the commitment of County Executive George Latimer and Mayors Mike Spano of Yonkers, Shawyn Patterson-Howard of Mount Vernon, for authorizing the full cooperation of their departments in working as an integral part of this initiative. As well as the leadership and partnership of the NY FBI and the Department of Justice Southern District of New York.
In a statement, the DA’s Office said this model allows for each law enforcement entity to share resources and information about cross-border criminal activity more effectively and efficiently, and provide more coordinated enforcement efforts and collaborative decisions about state, federal or joint prosecutions.
This enhanced partnership will further permit law enforcement to not only handle individual criminal cases in their jurisdictions, but also focus their partners on the inter-connectivity of criminal actors in their various jurisdictions. By staying ahead of the curve, targeting repeat violent offenders, and working collaboratively, we will add to the efforts of our hard-working police departments to keep our communities safe.
Jacqueline Maguire, acting Assistant Director-in-Charge of the FBI New York Field Office said, “By participating in this initiative, the FBI is reaffirming our commitment to our law enforcement partners and to our community. Far too many people are being victimized by violence, and we will continue to work through and expand the partnerships built on our Westchester County Safe Streets Task Force to combat this perpetual cycle. Together, we will use all tools and resources available on both the federal and state levels to pursue those responsible for the violence — and we will make sure they face justice.”
Westchester Department of Public Safety Commissioner Thomas A. Gleason said, “The Real Time Crime Center, where we gathered this morning, is another example of this initiative model in action. Every municipal police department in our County is represented in the intelligence center. We share information, even as crimes are in progress or have just occurred, and the results have been tremendous since RTC was created four years ago. County police detectives also serve in joint collaboration with the FBI, DEA and U.S. Marshals Service. We welcome this newest initiative because we know from experience that cooperation and collaboration is a critical way we keep Westchester safe. We are grateful to County Executive Latimer for his support of our Department and to District Attorney Rocah for her partnership in this newest initiative.”
Audrey Strauss, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said: “Combatting violence requires strong partnerships among all levels of law enforcement. Our Office is committed to continuing to work with our local, state and federal law enforcement partners to protect our communities and seek justice for the victims of violence.”
Mount Vernon Police Commissioner Glenn Scott said, “The criminal element is not confined to borders. Law enforcement must share intelligence, staff, and resources in order to combat this surge of gun violence that is sweeping our nation. The MVPD looks to further expand our partnerships by joining this initiative.”
Yonkers Police Commissioner John J. Mueller stated, “The Yonkers Police Department is grateful to all of the agencies that are contained within this partnership. We are always better together, working collaboratively with our federal, state, county and local partners to identify, arrest, prosecute and incarcerate our most violent offenders. With many jurisdictions in NYS facing an unacceptable increase in violent crime, now more than ever, we need to work together. The very nature of the success of a collaboration brings the unique skillsets of each partner with the ultimate goal of keeping the overwhelming number of hard-working, law-abiding community members safe from those who would commit violent crime.”
Yonkers Police Commissioner John J. Mueller unexpectedly raised the issue of “Raise the Age laws”, calling for the state law to be reformed. A large percentage of shootings in Yonkers, he said, involved gang members under 18.
Rocah made it clear she supports Raise the Age laws, but acknowledge the need for a hard look at the law.
“My real concern is people who are of adult age who are recruiting… recruiting… underage youth to participate in gangs and violent crimes in part because they know about Raise the Age, and they know that they will be able to skirt around the criminal justice system. Those are the people that we, and this task force and law enforcement, will be most focused on and this partnership and this initiative will allow us to collaborate even more strongly with our federal partners with all our departments to focus on those adult individuals who should know better because that is reprehensible. As for Raise the Age and the youth, I listen to the experience and the wisdom of my police commissioners like Commissioner Mueller, they are on the ground, they are seeing the reality of what is happening. We can’t ignore that. I am very much in favor of Raise the Age. I am very much in favor of the reforms of giving second chances to people with developing brains and the science behind that shows why, but we cannot let the violence escalate so if there is a recurring problem and loopholes being used we have to focus on that with our legislative partners to make sure the violence doesn’t escalate, so I will support looking closely at it carefully not acting in haste which I don’t think the Commissioner is doing to make sure we can try to solve that problem, but it’s really the adults who are recruiting these youth that we will be focused on.
We followed up by email with DA Rocah after the press conference. We asked if she was acknowledging the Raise the Age law incentives adults to recruit youngsters into gang violence and an unintended consequence of Raise the Age was to increase the participation of those under 18 in gang violence and gang-related shooting.
We have yet to receive a response, but will post one here.
We received a response from the Westchester County District Attorney’s Office:
As DA Rocah stated, a central focus of this initiative is to hold accountable adults who take advantage of young people and recruit and utilize them for gang violence. As she also said, she supports the Raise the Age reform and the issues of adults recruiting young people into gang activity predate that legislation. She will continue to consult with our LE partners to examine whether there are unintended consequence of RTA on our violent crime cases.
We asked the question because we figure anyone who has watched The Wire or Bulworth understands that gang leaders are well aware of how best to employ youths to game the criminal justice system so while perhaps unintended an increased recruiting of youths into gang violence was foreseeable.
Excellent comment
Its about time this city got some balls. Congratulations Chuck and the NR Police department and our new Commissioner for standing up for the tax payers.
Its about time someone called out this mayor and city council,They are creating another Bronx city with all of these building. We were the Queen city of the sound ,now we are in the media every week with gun violence., We need to take our city back .get stores where you can buy clothing not dollar store and fruit markets and bodegas.
You make me think I need to do an article on the origin of the sobriquet “Queen City of the Sound”.
The term appears first in a 1926 Chamber of Commerce book “New Rochelle: City of the Huguenots”.
As I understand it, the poet was James J. Montague, a journalist working for Hearst newspapers and others who lived in New Rochelle.
To that extent, the term was either created by the Chamber and a poem was commissioned or Montague wrote a poem and contributed to the book or some variation.
In any case, the term was created or adopted as a promotional tool by the Chamber and its members.
At the time New Rochelle was experiencing its biggest growth spurt, the 50 year period between incorporation as a City in 1899 and WWII.
1890 9,057
1900 14,720
1910 28,867
1920 36,213
1930 54,000
1940 58,408
The term was a self-appellation not some award bestowed on New Rochelle because of how wonderful the City was (not saying it was not just no cause-effect). The term was used to sell real estate, attract tourists and sell stuff.
Rather than say “we WERE the Queen City of the Sound” its more accurate to say the New Rochelle Chamber of Commerce created a brand around the title of a poem by a journalist who lived in New Rochelle.
I want to read the 1926 Chamber of Commerce book “New Rochelle: City of the Huguenots”. I asked the NRPL. If anyone has it as a PDF send it along.
Folks can feel free to expand on this.