NYPD Officers Instructed to Actually Report Crimes

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly laid down the law to the NYPD: Make it easier for New Yorkers to report crimes and make each one of them count.

In a memo issued last week and obtained by the Daily News, Kelly provided a veritable ‘Policing 101’ refresher.

The operational order spells out in painstaking detail the steps cops are supposed to take when someone wants to report a crime. It also warns cops to eliminate excuses for not taking complaints from victims.

Police officers were told to take reports even if:

*The victim can’t identify the suspect.

*Someone can’t provide a receipt for stolen items.

*The victim refuses to view photographs.

*The complainant won’t speak with detectives.

*The victim doesn’t want to prosecute an offender.

The memo urges police officers not to refer crime victims to another precinct if the crimes didn’t happen in their command. And Kelly reminds cops not to tell people to return to crime scenes and call 911 after they’ve come to a police station to report a crime.

The operations order issued on Tuesday comes, as the NYPD and others are investigating claims that police officers — under pressure to make the city appear safer — are fudging stats or making it difficult for people to report crimes.

Police officials called the operational order routine and denied it was prompted by controversy.

“We use operations to periodically remind personnel of proper procedures,” Deputy Police Commissioner Paul Browne said.

Police officials say cops have a better chance of solving crimes if the victims can identify the suspects or if complainants can provide a receipt for stolen property. Call 911 right away.

A handful of police officers, including Adrian Schoolcraft, who is suing the NYPD for allegedly forcing him into a mental institution, have said supervisors pressured officers to downgrade felonies to misdemeanors. Schoolcraft, assigned to the 81st Precinct in Bedford-Stuyvesant, also claimed that cops discouraged victims against filing complaints.

About a year ago, Kelly appointed a panel of former federal prosecutors to analyze how police take and file reports from victims. Police officials wouldn’t say if the panel finished its review. No findings have been made public.

City Councilman Peter Vallone (D-Queens), the head of the Public Safety Committee, said he has received numerous complaints from crime victims who couldn’t get police to file a report, or had a difficult time doing so.

“Everything from, ‘You have to go the precinct to file a report’ to, ‘We’re not going to take a report because you didn’t get a good look at the guy who robbed you,’ ” Vallone said. “It’s happened far too often to attribute it to a few confused police officers.”