Whitney Tilson's School Reform Blog: Ray Kelly rips anti-cop 'smear' campaign

After a recent discussion, I was sent a link to the ACLU report, Criminalizing the Classroom: The Over-Policing of New York City Schools, which you can read at:

http://www.aclu.org/pdfs/racialjustice/overpolicingschools_20070318.pdf.

Sadly, it's a hatchet job. I say sadly because I have no doubt that there are rogue officers like Gonzalez and that some of the report's recommendations might make sense -- but it's so hysterical and obviously biased that the entire report loses all credibility and it's easy to dismiss (see Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, below). As one example, consider this description on page 14:

On December 14, 2006 NYCLU and ACLU investigators had an opportunity to observe the deployment of roving metal detectors first-hand at Curtis High School, a school with nearly 2,700 students in Staten Island. This site visit was conducted with permission from the school principal and the Chancellor’s press office.

Approximately twenty NYPD vehicles surrounded the perimeter of Curtis High School that morning. Metal detectors were set up in the cafeteria; about sixty officers, both SSAs and full-fledged NYPD officers, encamped in the cafeteria and swarmed to areas outside the cafeteria.

The 2nd paragraph is so absurdly biased: "surrounded the perimeter", "encamped", "swarmed"?! Here's how a fair and objective report might have read:

The police officers arrived that morning in approximately twenty vehicles, which were parked outside Curtis High School. Metal detectors were set up in the cafeteria; about sixty officers, both SSAs and full-fledged NYPD officers, were in the cafeteria and nearby areas.

Here's NY Police Commissioner Ray Kelly's rebuttal:

Frustrated, perhaps, by an era of post-9/11 goodwill toward the police, some of the usual critics have come back with a vengeance recently to smear the NYPD with unfounded charges of racism and unconstitutional overreaching.

The New York Civil Liberties Union is perhaps the worst offender, using uncorroborated student accounts to publish a specious March report, "Criminalizing the Classroom," about police in public schools. A year earlier, it offered a $1,000 prize on its Web site for student essays - and then quoted from five of them in the anti-police report.

In what it claimed was an objective survey, the NYCLU poisoned the well by soliciting participation with material that said, "Every day students around New York City are mistreated by police officers in their schools. Whether in the hallways, at lunch, or going through metal detectors, students' rights are violated regularly."

The same report disingenuously blurred the distinction between police officer and civilian school safety agent to create the illusion that many more armed officers are in schools than actually are. It described a "massive" police presence - without disclosing that police, in fact, are assigned to fewer than 10% of public schools, with just one police officer in nine of 10 of those schools.

Our critics are less inclined to talk about how public safety improved markedly in the schools since the NYPD assumed responsibility. By last year, major crimes had dropped by more than 33%, possession of weapons and other dangerous instruments by 40% and sexual assaults by 50%. Since this past September, we have confiscated hundreds of knives, 23 real firearms and 111 pellet and imitation guns.

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NYPD True