By Brandon Lowrey | September 26, 2025, 6.55pm
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Three anonymous men on the New York Police DepartmentThe list of gang members urged a federal judge to reject the city's attempt to reject their putative collective appeal, saying that their complaints are based on current racial discrimination and civil rights violations.
The complainants deposited their memorandum Thursday in the Oriental District of New York opposing the city's offer to have the case reject with prejudice. The city had argued that the assertions were “very speculative” and did not suit a collective appeal.
But the complainants argued Thursday that the city's request was not only defective, but recognized that the complainants allegedly allegedly allegedly alleged their allegations.
“They do not deal with stunning racial disparities in their database, their knowledge of these disparities or other proofs of intentional discrimination,” argued the complainants.
The proposed collective appeal, filed with the New York Federal Court, challenges the largest database of criminal groups in the country's police department, a massive list of alleged gang members that NYPD has maintained is a key tool for investigators. However, 99% of the more than 13,000 people labeled as members of active gangs on the list are black or Latinos, some 13 years old, according to the complainants.
The class representatives proposed, identified only as “Adam”, “Bryan” and “Chris”, allege that they were personally harassed, monitored, detained and questioned because they were on the NYPD list. This has assigned their ability to address their family, publish online and even spend time with their children in local playgrounds, they say.
The complainants are represented by Ballard Spahr LLP and several non -profit groups. They allege that the conduct of the NYPD violated the first, fourth and fourteenth amendments, similar provisions in the constitution of the state and a prohibition from New York to a biased police. They seek to prevent the city from using or updated the list.
At the end of August, the city filed a request for rejection of the case with prejudices, arguing that the trial was speculative and that its allegations were not adapted to a collective appeal. The city also argued that the complainants should not be able to proceed anonymously.
On Thursday, the men argued that the request in dismissal of the city was an “attempt to redesign and restrict the claims of the complainants, suggesting, for example, that the complainants only dispute pretextual stops, rather than the creation of a racially sanctioned municipal surveillance program.”
The complainants are represented by Kevin Jason, Elizabeth Caldwell, Lauren Carbajal, Alexsis Johnson and Catherine Logue NAACP Legal Defense FundPhilip Desgranges, Rigodis Apping and Alexandra Ogunsanya of The Legal Aid CompanyAndrew Case and Mariana Lopez de Latinojusticeff, Anne Venuizen and Isabel Bolo de Bronx defenders And Samhitha Medatia, Marjorie Peerce, Samuel Erlanger, Marcel Pratt, Katherine Oaks and Christopher Hatfield of Ballard Spahr LLP.
The city and its officials are represented by Kathleen Reilly and Muriel Goode-Trifying from the New York Law Department.
The case is the complainants 1-3 et al. v. THE New York City et al., case number 1: 25-CV-02397in the American District Court for the Oriental District of New York.
– program by Janice Carter Brown.
