Audit Report on the Cash and Firearm Custody Controls of the Brooklyn Property Clerk Division of the Police Department

This audit determined whether the New York City Police Department (NYPD) has adequate controls over the acceptance, cataloging, safeguarding, and disposition of firearms and cash by the Brooklyn Property Clerk Division (Brooklyn Division).

The Brooklyn Division has two Intake areas to receive firearms and cash, one for Police Officers from any one of the 30 commands in Brooklyn who turn in cash as arrest or investigatory evidence or firearms for safekeeping, and one for Police Officers from the Police Laboratory who turn in firearms as evidence. The property is kept in safes according to storage numbers—cash as evidence is secured in the Cash Safe; handguns for safekeeping only are secured in the Handgun Safe; and handguns as evidence as well as shoulder weapons as evidence or for safekeeping are secured in the Arrest Safe.

A Cash Safe Logbook and Firearm Safe Logbook are maintained to record information about the cash and firearms. In addition, cash received for safekeeping is deposited by the respective command at a bank in a Property Clerk Holding Account. The cash placed in the safe and the cash deposited in the bank are both recorded in a Cash Ledger.

According to the Property Clerk Division Borough Monthly Activity Recap, the Brooklyn Division reported that during Fiscal Year 2009, it received 1,684 firearms. According to the Cash Ledger for Fiscal Year 2009, the Brooklyn Division reported that it received $5.2 million in cash.

Audit Findings and Conclusions

The NYPD controls over the acceptance, safeguarding, and disposition of firearms and cash by the Brooklyn Division are generally adequate, but weaknesses exist in its cataloging of the firearms and cash received. We found that all but one of the sampled firearms reported to be in a safe or at the Property Clerk Division’s warehouse were immediately accounted for and that there was adequate documentation (i.e., Charge-Out Cards, fingerprinting, and Property Clerk’s Delivery Receipts) to support firearms that were either signed-out (such as for presentation at Criminal Court) or were returned to their rightful owners. In addition, the Handgun, Arrest, and Cash Safes were locked at all times and were entered only by authorized personnel. Furthermore, all of the cash selected in our samples was adequately accounted for and handled in accordance with NYPD procedures. Also, the disbursements were properly authorized and adequately supported in the hard-copy files.

Nevertheless, we identified some areas where improvement is warranted. Findings included the following: data in the Firearm Safe Logbooks was incomplete and inaccurate; failure to reconcile the number of firearms recorded on Property Clerk’s Delivery Receipts with the number recorded on invoices, resulting in the NYPD being unable to initially account for a sampled firearm; the number of firearms and cash invoices accepted was inconsistently reported; firearm data recorded on invoices was not always verified for accuracy and completeness upon intake; and some of the firearms held for safekeeping were not destroyed after one year as required.

Audit Recommendations

Based on our findings, we make 12 recommendations, including that NYPD:

• Ensures that Brooklyn Division officials follow procedures outlined in the Property Clerk Division’s Property Guide with regard to recording the receipt of actual firearms in the Firearm Safe Logbooks.
• Ensures that the Brooklyn Division documents that the number of firearms recorded on the Property Clerk’s Delivery Receipts reconciles with the number recorded on the supporting invoices before firearms are returned to the originating commands.
• Ensures that officials responsible for the preparation and review of internal statistics regarding the number of firearms and cash invoices received by the Brooklyn Division attest that the data is adequately supported and has been reviewed for accuracy and completeness.
• Includes instructions in the Property Guide on handling discrepancies between firearm data contained in the invoices and data obtained from the Intake clerks’ observations of the firearms.
• Follows the procedures governing the destruction of safekeeping firearms after the allotted time of one year, as required by New York State Penal Law.

Agency Response

In their response, NYPD officials stated that four recommendations needed further analysis and evaluation. Officials generally agreed in principle with the remaining eight recommendations, but claimed that four of them were “unnecessary” because their implementation “was planned or existed independent of the audit.”