The judge ruled that New York City cannot keep secret its arguments when it says it should not have to disclose documents about police surveillance of the protesters before the 2004 Republican Convention had taken place.
James C. Francis IV, the United States Magistrate Judge in Manhattan said that the public and the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) can view the arguments of NYPD commissioner David Cohen for intelligence. So far, the NYCLU has filed a suit on behalf of over 1,800 people that were arrested at the convention.
Cohen argued that some strands of information disclosed by Francis could reveal the identities of undercover officers and informants along with disclose methods of operation that would undermine operations of enforcing law. Francis replied in his ruling that Cohen could still refer to secret documents without revealing sensitive information.
“Permitting the submission of secret argument is antithetical to our adversary system of justice,” the judge wrote.
Christopher Dunn who is the legal director at the NYCLU said that the ruling made it clear that the NYPD’s aggressive tactics cannot be kept in the closet. Dunn added: “If the NYPD wants to rely on its political-surveillance operation to defend its tactics, the department must disclose the details of that operation.”
The group said that those arrests violated civil rights.
The court documents had also revealed that the protesters arrested were held six times longer before their initial court dates than those who were arrested on charges unrelated to the GOP Convention.
The NYCLU argued that it was a deliberate policy decision to keep protesters off the streets. While both sides agree that some documents could remain in secret, the NYCLU challenged the secrecy of other documents.