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An undercover NYPD officer entered the spotless Super Laundromat & Dry Cleaners in Inwood, a largely Dominican neighborhood at the northernmost tip of Manhattan. He made his rounds through the store, hawking what he said were stolen gadgets — an iPhone, iPad Mini and iPad.
One man took the bait, agreeing to shell out $200 for all three. He was arrested during the May 2013 sting, and the trouble seemed to end there.
But seven months later — the week before Christmas — cops arrived at the laundromat again. This time, they slapped a neon sticker on the front door declaring in block letters: “RESTRAINING ORDER.”
They presented the store’s owner, Sung Cho, with a daunting slew of legal papers, threatening to shutter the laundromat for a year and auction off everything inside. Their justification, the cops said: The store was being “used to facilitate criminal possession of stolen property.”
Cho was shocked. The 54-year-old Korean immigrant said he had operated his shop for six years without a problem. He says he had even helped cops solve neighborhood crimes, giving them video footage of the sidewalk outside his store.
To build its case, the NYPD cited the May 2013 arrest, along with one other undercover sale of an iPad months earlier for $100 and tips that people inside the laundromat were buying stolen property. Cho said police never told him about the iPad sale or the tips.
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Cho was facing a nuisance abatement action, civil lawsuits intended to uproot persistent illegal activities by targeting the locations they stem from. Nuisance abatement became city law in the 1970s as a tool to clean up the sex industry in Times Square.
But today it’s being used quite differently — often ensnaring legal mom-and-pop shops that are almost exclusively located in minority neighborhoods, a Daily News and ProPublica investigation found.
Owners interviewed for this story, all first- and second-generation immigrants, say they felt entrapped and then strong-armed into signing settlements with steep fines and onerous conditions. The stipulations often allow for sweeping surveillance, such as warrantless searches and unbridled police access to video cameras. They also permit the NYPD to automatically fine and padlock a store should another allegation arise — all without giving merchants the opportunity to defend themselves in court.
An examination by the Daily News and ProPublica of 646 cases filed by the NYPD against businesses over an 18-month period beginning in 2013 found:
Nine out of 10 nuisance abatement actions were against businesses located in neighborhoods where most of the residents are minorities.
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The majority of the cases, 58 percent, involve alcohol violations, often against bodegas or liquor stores accused of selling to underage buyers working for the police. A large share of the alcohol cases were concentrated in just a few police precincts. Other precincts in the city with equal or more underage alcohol sales were rarely hit.
Merchants often endure a kind of double jeopardy. By law, the NYPD forwards every arrest or summons for alcohol violations to the State Liquor Authority, which can issue thousands of dollars in fines and revoke a business’ license to sell alcohol.
The NYPD can then also bring nuisance abatement actions based on the same allegations, but only does so against some businesses.
The police begin nearly every case with a secret application to a judge requesting an order closing the business while the case is being decided, and before the owner has had the opportunity to appear in court. Judges approved the closure requests 70% of the time.
By law, the first court date must come within three business days after the order has been served. But the NYPD frequently files its closure requests on Thursdays or Fridays, forcing shops to stay closed through the weekend and causing a greater loss of income.
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NYPD lawyers justify these emergency orders by claiming the illegal activity at the location is ongoing and poses an immediate threat to the community.
But the Daily News and ProPublica found the NYPD didn’t get around to filing cases until, on average, five months after the last offense cited.
Most cases resulted in settlements, 333 of which allow the NYPD to conduct warrantless searches. In 102 cases, the owner agreed to install cameras that the NYPD can access upon request.
Another 127 settlements require storeowners to use electronic card readers that store customers’ ID information, also available to the NYPD upon request.
Once served with nuisance abatement actions, business owners are faced with a choice. They can fight the case and remain shut down until it’s resolved, earning no income. Or they can agree to the NYPD’s demands, sign a settlement, and reopen. As a result, cases tend to get resolved very quickly.
A judge denied the cops’ request to close Cho’s laundromat, but Cho was still left with an ominous-sounding restraining order.
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“They say that I facilitate these activities, prove me so. How did I facilitate these things?” Cho told the Daily News. “In my view it was total entrapment.”
At the 47th Precinct in the Bronx, which is 91% black and Hispanic, storeowners described similar tactics. Police brought 69 nuisance abatement actions over the 18-month period examined by the Daily News and ProPublica, nearly all of which cite alcohol violations.
Jose Castillo, who owned Castillo Grocery, said the undercover auxiliary police officer who came into his store was wearing a hoodie and a hat so you could barely see his face. He said the man grabbed a beer, threw money on the counter, and left before he even had a chance to speak to him.
“It was always the same guy, and you’ll never find out if the guy was a really a minor. They never prove it,” Castillo said.
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