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Report: Nassau Police failed to help non-English speakers who called them almost half the time
By
Charles Lane
Published Sep 13, 2022
Modified Sep 13, 2022
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Leonard Zhukovsky/Shutterstock
By
Charles Lane
Published Sep 13, 2022
Modified Sep 13, 2022
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Volunteer testers who call Nassau County police precincts and headquarters and speak only Spanish only got help about half the time, according to a new report by advocacy groups the Long Island Language Advocates Coalition and the New York Immigration Coalition.
A team of seven volunteers made 94 phone calls in Spanish to all of Nassau’s precincts and headquarters for the study. More than a third of the callers were disconnected and another 16% were intentionally hung up on, according to the report.
“Language access saves lives. It is very important for the community to receive equal treatment,” Ivan Larios, an organizer with the New York Immigration Coalition, said. “They could lose their lives in cases of domestic violence."
Neither the police department nor the Nassau County executive's office returned multiple calls seeking comment on the report. Federal laws require police to assist non-English speakers. Following a 2013 agreement with the state's attorney general, Nassau County Executive Ed Mangano signed two executive orders requiring county agencies to follow best practices with language access.
Nassau County is home to roughly 160,000 people born in Latin America who speak Spanish at home and almost 100,000 people born in Asia who speak mostly Korean or Mandarin.
For at least a decade, the police department has been using LanguageLine, a service that connects officers to live translators through a phone app. However, advocates say police usage of the service was never great. During the state-mandated police reform process, Spanish speakers frequently complained about lack of access to police in their native language.
In January of this year, Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder told the Legislature that in 2021 police made 8,964 calls to LanguageLine, most of them were for Spanish interpretation.
In the same meeting with lawmakers, Ryder said he had met with the Long Island Language Advocates Coalition about their concerns.
“There’s work to be done to make it better,” Ryder told the Legislature, “We’re moving in the same direction, going to the same goal. So everything's been working well.”
Advocates with the Long Island Language Advocates Coalition had a much different takeaway from that meeting.
According to Cheryl Keshner with the Long Island Language Advocates Coalition, Ryder was told about several cases in which domestic violence victims sought police help but were turned away because they didn’t speak English. Keshner says nothing ever came of the meeting.
“There were certain changes that it sounded like they were going to make,” Kreshner said. “But honestly, they have not responded to our requests to meet since then.”
Tagged
police
long island
nassau county
Charles Lane
Charles is a Day-of reporter focused on breaking news and enterprise. He’s very friendly and can be reached at [email protected], or more securely on whatsapp/signal 631-295-6715
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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