100s Of Cops Head To Brooklyn In Holiday Weekend Safety Crackdown

BROOKLYN, NY — Officials are urging thousands of New Yorkers who would normally be heading out onto the streets this weekend to kick off Caribbean Carnival or Labor Day events to celebrate "at heart" instead.

Central Brooklyn — normally the site of the West Indian Day Parade and J'Ouvert festival — will have hundreds more cops patrolling the streets throughout the holiday weekend to discourage large gatherings and protect against an ongoing surge in gun violence, officials announced Thursday.

The added cops, and officers from the NYC Sheriff's Office, will come with light towers and pamphlets about social distancing, officials said.

"Our message to New Yorkers is: don’t gather in large groups on the streets anywhere in this city," NYPD Chief of Department Terence Monahan said. "We are counting on everyone to help us make this a very safe weekend."

The extra cops will head out across the five boroughs throughout the weekend, with a specific focus on the usual parade spots in Brooklyn and neighborhoods that have seen a problem with gun violence or large parties, Monahan said.

The announcement comes as both of the usual events celebrating Carnival have moved online or been scaled back given the coronavirus pandemic.

The West Indian Day Parade will instead be celebrated through two virtual events on Friday and Monday while J'Ouvert, the pre-dawn Labor Day parade that usually kicks off the festivities, will take the form of a small ceremony to honor essential workers.

Officials urged New Yorkers to celebrate the holidays online, or at their own homes, instead of with large gatherings.

"Here in central Brooklyn we remain committed to carnival at heart," U.S. Rep. Yvette Clarke said.

"We should all be proud of the contributions of the Caribbean community to the city of New York, but we are in the midst of this pandemic. While tradition has dictated in the past that we gather together, this is not the time."

Monahan said cops will be on the lookout for gatherings in the street, but also for large house parties that have become a problem this summer as New Yorkers' options for socializing are limited by the coronavirus pandemic.

The gatherings pose a particular safety challenge when one or more people in the crowd are carrying guns, as is the case in neighborhoods where gang-related gun violence has spiked, Monahan said.

"On multiple instances, when we go into these large crowds, it’s not one person with a gun, it may be 10 people with guns," Monahan said. "We have to make sure when we’re going into these events we have more than enough cops on the scene to be able to keep them safe as well as keeping other people at that event safe."

Crime statistics released this week show that more than a quarter of shooting incidents so far this year have been in just five Brooklyn precincts. Overall, shootings jumped 166 percent compared to August last year, the NYPD data shows.

Monahan urged people from other parts of New York City or the surrounding states not to visit Brooklyn for the holiday. New Yorkers should celebrate in their own neighborhoods on a small scale, he said.

"There are no events to come see," Monahan said. "Do I expect people who live in Brooklyn are still going to be celebrating? Sure, but we’re asking they celebrate small."