Dems in NYC Demand Fed Police to End "Hostile Arrests" Against Gay Men(Follow up)

Penn Station subway detail, New York City | Shutterstock 

Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) has joined forces with three New York state lawmakers in a call for Amtrak Police to stop targeting gay men at New York City’s Penn Station.

A letter to National Railroad Passenger Corporation (Amtrak) President Roger Harris accuses Amtrak Police, which are federally run, of preying on gay men for allegedly cruising for sex at the station.  

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Nadler – along with Democratic state Sens. Brad Hoylman-Segal and Liz Krueger and Democratic Assembly Member Tony Simone – said reports show police are making as many as 20 arrests per day for “public lewdness.”

“The reporting also indicates that many of these charges have been ultimately dropped but only after LGBTQ New Yorkers have been handcuffed and arrested,” they wrote, adding that officers have been “using constitutionally dubious tactics to target individuals they perceive as targets for arrest, including by using apps popular with gay men and by approaching and propositioning users of the bathroom.”  The letter acknowledged that Amtrak has a right to keep its facilities free of “illicit” use, but said it is not acceptable to do so “with a hostile arrest campaign reminiscent of anti-LGBTQ policing from the Stonewall era.” 

“There is a long and painful tradition of police forces using loitering, identification, prostitution, lewdness, and similar laws to target LGBTQ people for harassment, arrest, and incarceration,” the lawmakers explained.

They demanded that Amtrak Police immediately stop targeting people for arrest based on perceived LGBTQ+ identity, which they said is likely a violation of the 14th Amendment. They also asked for a meeting to discuss the matter further.

“Specifically, it is imperative that Amtrak provide clarification or justification for its reported arrest campaign and commit to exploring alternatives that further Amtrak’s goals without subjecting New Yorkers to arrest and detention solely on the basis of their perceived sexual orientation or gender identity,” they wrote.

The letter comes a few days after a report in Gothamist said the Amtrak Police’s targeted campaign has resulted in the arrest and detainment of nearly 200 individuals since June.

One arrestee alleged that police called him a homophobic slur, an attorney said the arrests may be “flawed,” and two gay government officials accused authorities of conducting an “alarming” and “deceitful” operation targeting gay men.

The Amtrak Police reportedly placed undercover officers in a transit station restroom, which appears as a popular sex location on cruising apps like Sniffies, which help men arrange public sex encounters. The officers then hid in toilet stalls or pretended to use the urinals to watch for sexual activity.

Only 12 people were arrested for public lewdness in the restroom before June, but since Pride Month, nearly 200 arrests have occurred there. Amtrak police reportedly handed 20 of the arrestees over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) without any legal charges. Though state and city laws ban New York police from giving detainees to ICE, Amtrak is allowed to do so since it operates as a federal agency.

“It’s definitely a cause for concern,” said Jennvine Wong, a supervising attorney at the Cop Accountability Project for the Legal Aid Society One. She said the sudden rise in arrests and lack of prosecutions suggest that “the enforcement and cause for arrests may be flawed,” Gothamist reported.

While body camera footage showed officers arresting two men groping each other at a urinal, out gay New York City Councilman Erik Bottcher (co-chair of the council’s LGBTQ+ caucus) wrote in a Thursday letter to Amtrak’s president that one arrestee — a 31-year-old healthcare worker named David — was arrested while “simply trying to use the bathroom while wearing a Pride wristband.”

“These reports reveal deeply alarming violations of civil rights, due process, and protections against discriminatory policing,” Bottcher wrote, adding that a similar 2022 sting by Port Authority police was abandoned after a lawsuit revealed “years of false arrests and unlawful targeting based on perceived sexuality.”

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