NYPD Disbands Unit That Spied on Muslims

The New York Police Department has dismantled a unit that was tasked with spying on Muslim communities around New York City and even outside of it, according to The New York Times.

The so-called Demographics Unit consisted of plain clothes detectives infiltrating Muslim neighborhoods to create dossiers and maps of where residents prayed, shopped and ate, the Associated Press revealed in 2011. The goal of the program was to identify would-be terrorists blending with other members of the community.

The department reportedly told a group of advocates last week that the covert program was shut down. The unit has been inactive since the new NYPD chief William Bratton took over from Ray Kelly in January, and its detectives have been reassigned, NYPD's spokesperson Stephen Davis told the Times. Read more...