My name is Donavon Taveras. I was born and raised in Bushwick and am the Community Safety Coordinator for the Justice Committee, a 40-year-old grassroots organization that is dedicated to building a movement against police violence and systemic racism in New York City.
The heart of JC’s work is organizing and uplifting the leadership of families who have lost loved ones to the police and survivors of police violence. We empower our community to deter police violence, hold law enforcement accountable, and build people-led community safety through grassroots organizing campaigns, community empowerment, political education, our CopWatch program, and by developing safety mechanisms and projects that decrease reliance on police.
It is through this lens and expertise that the Justice Committee strongly opposes the appointment of Randy Mastro as corporation counsel.
Given Mr. Mastro’s long history of supporting racist policing and other racist policies and as part of the Giuliani administration, his return to NYC government as corporation counsel will only serve to further Mayor Adams’ agenda to erode police accountability and build New York City as a police state.
A Guilani loyalist to the core, Mastro played an essential role in the administration under which the NYPD murdered Anthony Baez, Antonio Rozario, Hilton Vega, Yong Xin Huang, Amadou Diallo, Anibal Carrasquillo, Frankie Arzuaga, Nicholas Heyward Jr. (with whose families the Justice Committee organized) and which shielded the officers who took their lives from. Mastro defended Guiliani’s violent broken windows policing that plagued Black and Latine communities in the 90s and set the stage for the further ballooning of unconstitutional stop-and-frisk under Mayor Bloomberg, which is resurging under Eric Adams. Mastro backed Guiliani up in his dismissal of police accountability and transparency recommendations of the Task Force on Police/Community Relations, including the dismal of a 48-hour rule (which allowed NYPD officers involved in a shooting to refuse to speak with investigators until two days after the fact) and more rigorous screenings of new police officers.
While Mastro may be an experienced litigator, he has used his legal knowledge to undermine public safety and health. In both his public service and private practice, his record demonstrates his inability to serve the interests of our City as corporation counsel, a role that requires a commitment to justice, equity, and the public interest.
In his private practice, Mastro fought against public health and safety initiatives such as housing individuals who were homeless during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, worked to keep housing and shelter from being built in the Upper East Side and litigated to weaken the city’s rent stabilization laws as well as to end New York State’s eviction moratorium. Time and time again, Mastro has proven to put the interest of corporations, corrupt politicians, and police over the needs of the public's health, safety, and well-being.
Since he took office as mayor, Eric Adams has been working diligently to expand the NYPD’s power and role in New Yorkers lives and shield abusive officers from accountability. Adams’ sham charter revision process and proposed charter changes to make the process for passing public safety legislation more difficult is case in point, as is the systemic burying of police misconduct complaints during his tenure as mayor and his refusal to ensure accountability for the officers who killed Kawaski Trawick in his home in under two minutes, a case in which substantiated fireable charges were dismissed because of NYPD delays and obstruction.
With the families of Win Rozario, Allan Feliz, Delrawn Small, and Antonio Williams in the midst of fighting for the officers who killed their loved ones to be fired and Civilian Complaint Review Board investigations or prosecutions pending, we’re deeply concerned about what it would mean for Mastro to take on the role of corporation council, especially given that this position is tasked with representing the CCRB when police union attorneys use bogus legal maneuvers to try to shield their clients and delay administrative trials.
If his appointment is confirmed, Mastro would be at the legal helm as the Adams administration continues to erode police accountability while working to expand the NYPD’s power to use force against and involuntarily remove from public space and hospitalize New Yorkers without suspicion of criminality.
As an organization dedicated to true safety for all New Yorkers, we urge the City Council to reject Mastro’s nomination.
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