A scandal-scarred NYPD official testified yesterday that he never set quotas for stop-and-frisks and summonses in a crime-ridden Brooklyn precinct — although secret recordings revealed a subordinate ordering cops to make at least two stops a day.
Deputy Inspector Steven Mauriello conceded that a lieutenant was caught saying that 81st Precinct brass had “laid down a number.”
“But I don’t know anything about any so-called number,” Mauriello testified at the stop-and-frisk trial in Manhattan federal court. “This is news to me. There’s no such thing as a set number in that precinct.”
Mauriello also said he didn’t believe Lt. Jean Delafuente was encouraging racial stereotyping when he told cops at a 2008 roll call, “You know, you’re not working in Midtown Manhattan, where people are walking around smiling and happy. You’re working in Bed-Stuy, where everyone’s probably got a warrant.”
The secret recordings were made by since-suspended cop Adrian Schoolcraft, who’s suing the city for $50 million over his forced hospitalization in a mental ward — which Schoolcraft claims was retaliation for exposing quotas and the downgrading of crimes at the precinct.
Mauriello was transferred to a transit division in 2010 and later slapped with internal charges for allegedly manipulating crime stats at the 81st and misleading police investigators about it.