New York’s chief judge has ordered an investigation into a powerful courthouse union leader over allegations of “racial inequality and brutality” against black court officers, The Post has learned.
An email sent to Chief Judge Janet DiFiore called Dennis Quirk, longtime president of the New York State Court Officers Association, a “safe haven for racist speech and actions” and claimed that “there is proof of this.”
“He has on many occasions used racist dog whistles against anyone who dares to oppose him,” according to the email, obtained by The Post.
“Officers in the past who have spoken out regarding racial inequality and brutality have been retaliated against by forced transfers and in other cases had minuscule or fabricated disciplinary charges brought against them.”
The Thursday email was signed by three black Brooklyn court officers — Al James, Mike Jones and Darien Wagner — who said they were writing on behalf of the 42 black court officers assigned to Brooklyn Criminal Court.
“We black officers, feel we have no where to turn,” they wrote.
“We have never been represented or respected by those who are charged to do so.”
In response, DiFiore wrote back and said she was forwarding their complaints to former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, who she on Tuesday announced would lead an “independent review of the New York State court system’s response to issues of institutional racism” in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd.
“You have described a pattern of biased and retaliatory action by NYSCOA leaders against Black Officers which falls squarely within Secretary Johnson’s mandate to help us root out racism and bias from the structure, operations and practices of the Unified Court System,” DiFiore added.
Quirk vehemently denied any allegations of bias or racism.
“We have a great relationship with our minority officers,” he said.
Quirk noted that he’s publicly condemned the Minneapolis cops charged in Floyd’s slaying, as well as the white Brooklyn court officer, Sgt. Terri Pinto Napolitano, who was suspended and slapped with disciplinary charges for allegedly posting a meme on Facebook that depicted the lynching of former President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton being led to a gallows.
Quirk also said that “we don’t transfer people” and that “we don’t bring disciplinary charges, we defend people against disciplinary charges.”
“We support our black officers who get in trouble. We don’t support Napolitano and we believe all lives matter,” he said.
Quirk also accused DiFiore of failing to show support for minority court officers sickened by the coronavirus, including one who spent weeks on a ventilator and another who lost part of his arm.
“We’re fighting with her because she’s opening courthouses, putting my people and the public in jeopardy, and this is the response that we get,” he said.
Quirk, 70, has led the Court Officers Association for 46 years and was paid $133,000 by the union’s Security Benefit Fund during fiscal 2017, according to its most recent tax-exempt filing with the IRS.
He was also paid $93,960 by the state during fiscal 2019, according to the See Through New York website.
In 2018, DiFiore and Quirk clashed over T-shirts that some court officers wore to a rally for increased hiring and pay raises outside Manhattan Supreme Court when DiFiore went there to receive an award from the Cervantes Society of America.
The shirts likened the state Office of Court Administration to an “Organized Crime Organization” — which DiFiore, an Italian American, took as an insult based on her heritage.
“The public display by court personnel, on or off duty of a message that invokes and perpetuates vile and insidious ethnic stereotypes — whether, as here, directed at an Italian-American or at any other group of people who historically have been subjected to such discriminatory tactics — is simply malicious and offensive,” she told Quirk in a letter.
Quirk ignored DiFiore’s demand for “a public apology for your degrading and disrespectful conduct.”
“This has nothing to do with Italians or Italian Americans and you know it,” Quirk shot back in an email.
“You should be ashamed of yourself.”