What to do in the first week
The first week after an arrest, a beating or a search decides what evidence will exist a year later. Get medical care and keep the records. Write down what happened, with the date. Find the witnesses. Photograph the injuries. Request the body-camera footage. Say nothing about the arrest to anyone but your lawyers, and post nothing. And if the officers were New York City or New York municipal police, the 90-day clock on the notice of claim is already running. This page is the checklist, in order.
A police abuse case is decided on what can be proved about a few minutes. Most of the proof, the footage, the 911 recording, the witnesses' memories, the bruises, exists only briefly unless someone acts. This page is what to do in the first seven days, in the order it matters. None of it requires deciding whether to sue. All of it is undone at no cost if you decide not to.
First: if a criminal charge is pending
If you were charged with anything from the same incident, resisting arrest, obstruction, disorderly conduct, assault on an officer, the criminal case comes first and it changes what you should do this week. Talk to your defense lawyer before describing the arrest to anyone. Do not give a statement to the police, the CCRB, an investigator or a reporter. Do not name the officers online. Do not post about the arrest at all. Everything you say about the incident can be used in the criminal case, and a plea or a conviction can close a civil claim under Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994). The criminal case and civil case page explains how the two cases are sequenced. The rest of this page can be done without a word about what happened.
The safer path
Preserve, do not narrate. Get treatment, keep every document, photograph the injuries, write your own account and give it only to your lawyers, request the footage in writing, and let a lawyer serve the notice of claim. A notice of claim states the date, the place, the nature of the claim and the injuries; it is not your story of the arrest. Nothing on this list requires you to describe the incident to anyone outside the attorney-client relationship.
The checklist
1. Medical care, and the records
Go to an emergency room or a doctor, today if you have not. Tell the provider what hurts and how it happened in the fewest words that get you treated ("I was struck on the head during an arrest"), not a narrative. Ask for the discharge papers and keep them. Photographs a provider takes go in the chart; ask that they be taken. A medical record dated within a day of the incident is the single most persuasive document about the injury, and one dated three weeks later invites the argument that something else caused it. Keep every follow-up appointment.
2. A dated written account, for your lawyer only
Write down what happened while it is fresh: where you were, what time, what the officers said, what you said, what they did, in what order, how long you were held, who was there. Date it. Sign it. Give it to your lawyer and no one else. Do not post it, do not email it to friends, do not read it to anyone. A private account written for counsel is protected; the same words on a social media account are evidence for the other side.
3. Witnesses
Names and phone numbers of everyone who saw any part of it, including people you do not know. A first name and a description of where they were standing is better than nothing. Ask whether anyone recorded it on a phone, and ask them to keep the recording. Do not ask witnesses what they saw and do not discuss the incident with them; your lawyer will take their accounts. Memory fades, phones get replaced, and a witness located a year later is often a witness lost.
4. Photographs of injuries
Photograph every injury the day it happened and again every day for a week, with something in the frame that shows the date (a phone screen showing the date works). Bruises darken over days; a photograph from day three often shows what day one did not. Photograph torn clothing and broken property before anything is washed or repaired.
5. The business card, and the footage request
If NYPD officers stopped or searched you, the Right to Know Act required them to identify themselves by name, rank, command and shield number and to give you a business card with information on how to file a complaint and where to request body-camera footage (Local Law 54 of 2018, effective October 19, 2018). Keep the card; if you did not get one, that is itself a fact. The NYPD directs civilians to request body-worn camera footage under the Freedom of Information Law. We send that request in the first week, together with a written request that the department preserve all footage, 911 and radio recordings, and surveillance video of the incident. The NYPD's own retention period for footage is not published on this site because we have not verified it, which is exactly why the request goes out immediately. In New Jersey a written request from a member of the public extends body-camera retention to three years (N.J.S.A. 40A:14-118.5). The evidence page explains each request.
6. The notice of claim
90 days, and it is already running
A state-law claim against the City of New York or any other New York city, county, town or village for what its police did requires a notice of claim served within 90 days after the claim arose, on the officer the law designates to receive it, which for the City is the Comptroller (N.Y. Gen. Mun. Law § 50-e(1)(a), (3)). Suit must follow within one year and 90 days (§ 50-i(1)). New Jersey's Tort Claims Act notice is also due within 90 days (N.J.S.A. 59:8-8). The federal claim needs no notice (Felder v. Casey, 487 U.S. 131 (1988)), but the notice is what keeps the direct claim against the City. Serve it, then decide.
The notice states the claimant's name and address, the nature of the claim, the time, place and manner in which it arose, and the injuries claimed (§ 50-e(2)). It does not require your account of the arrest and it does not commit you to a lawsuit. The notice of claim page goes through it. After it is served the City may demand a 50-h examination, sworn testimony about the claim (§ 50-h); with a charge pending, that examination is adjourned or handled with both lawyers in the room.
7. Do not post
Nothing about the arrest, the officers, the injuries or the case, on any platform, until the case is over. No photographs of injuries online; keep them for your lawyer. No comments on news stories. No messages to the officers' department. What is posted is collected by the defense and read to a jury, and a single sentence written in anger on the night of the arrest can cost more than the injury did.
8. The CCRB question
In New York City you can file a complaint with the Civilian Complaint Review Board, which investigates and recommends discipline but does not award damages or file lawsuits. NYPD discipline must be commenced within 18 months of the incident (N.Y. Civ. Serv. Law § 75(4)), and the CCRB treats a complaint filed more than a year after the incident as late (38-A RCNY § 1-15). So there is time, and the complaint should wait for counsel: it is a statement about the incident, and with a charge pending it should not be made without your defense lawyer's agreement. The CCRB page explains how a complaint and a lawsuit interact. Filing one does not extend any deadline on this page.
9. If the person is still in custody
A person still in a jail or prison has one more thing to do now. Federal law bars a prisoner's Section 1983 action about prison conditions "until such administrative remedies as are available are exhausted" (42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a)), and there is no "special circumstances" exception, though a grievance process that is a dead end, opaque or thwarted by officials is not "available" (Ross v. Blake, 578 U.S. 632 (2016)). File the facility's grievance now, follow every step and every appeal, keep copies of everything, and write down the date of each submission. A family member can call us; the notice of claim can be served on the person's behalf, and the jail and prison page covers the rest.
What to have ready when you call
The first call is short and takes no narrative. Have these at hand:
- The date and approximate time of the incident.
- The place: the address, the intersection, the precinct, the facility.
- The agency, if you know it: NYPD, a county sheriff, State Police, a jail, a federal agency.
- Whether you were charged, with what, and the next court date.
- Your defense lawyer's name and number, if you have one.
- Where you were treated, and when.
- The Right to Know business card, the desk appearance ticket, the property voucher, any paperwork the officers or the court gave you.
- Whether anyone recorded the incident, and whether you filed anything anywhere.
We will ask about what happened by phone, and with your defense lawyer present if a charge is open. The consultation form takes a date, an agency and a kind of incident, on purpose; it does not take a story. Everything on this page can be done in a week, and the week is the part of the case you control.
Evidence and body cameras
Each request in the first week: footage, 911 and radio, surveillance video, medical records, the officers' histories.
Evidence →The 90-day notice of claim
What goes in it, where it goes, the 50-h examination, and what a court can do when it is late.
Notice of claim →The criminal case
Why the criminal case comes first, what a plea does to the civil claim, and how the two are sequenced.
The two cases →Common questions
I have a criminal charge from the same arrest. What do I do first?
Talk to your defense lawyer before you describe the arrest to anyone else, including us, the CCRB, a doctor's intake form beyond what treatment requires, or the internet. The criminal case comes first. We coordinate with defense counsel and do not take a statement without them. The deadlines on this page can be protected without a narrative; a notice of claim needs the date, the place and the nature of the claim, not your account of the arrest.
Should I file a CCRB complaint right away?
Not before talking to a lawyer, and not while a charge is pending without your defense lawyer's agreement. A CCRB complaint is a statement about the incident. The CCRB treats a complaint as late after one year and NYPD discipline must be commenced within 18 months, so there is time to decide. The complaint does not extend any lawsuit deadline.
I am still in jail. Does any of this apply?
Yes, with one addition. A prisoner's claim about prison conditions cannot be brought under Section 1983 until the facility's grievance process has been exhausted, so file the grievance now, follow every step, and keep copies. Ask a family member to call us. The notice of claim can be served on your behalf.
What should I have ready when I call?
The date and approximate time of the incident, the place, which agency the officers were from if you know it, whether you were charged and with what, whether you have a defense lawyer and their name, where you were treated, and the business card or any paperwork the officers gave you. Do not write out a narrative to send us. We will ask the questions by phone.
Tell us what happened.
One conversation with an attorney, in your language. We tell you which claims the facts support, which deadline runs first for the agency involved, what evidence to preserve this week, and whether a pending criminal case changes the timing. If it is not a case we can take, we say so and tell you where to go.
(718) 484-7510If a criminal charge is still open, talk to your defense lawyer before you describe the arrest to anyone, including us. English, Russian and Spanish in-house; an interpreter for any other language. Contingency fee, confirmed in writing before we begin.