NEW YORK — New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and Police Commissioner Bill Bratton told The Daily Caller Thursday that the city’s police department gun licensing process made need reforms, but neither would confirm that the NYPD favors issuing carry licenses to the wealthy and well-connected.
Four NYPD officials were arrested by the FBI Monday and charged with accepting bribes in exchange for expediting gun-licensing applications, prosecutors said.
A friend of de Blasio’s, Jeremy Reichberg, a Brooklyn businessman with NYPD connection, was also arrested by the feds, the New York Post reported.
Both he and his businessman friend Jona Rechnitz allegedly benefited from a mutual relationship with the NYPD, which included lavish trips, police escorts, expensive gifts and prostitutes.
“Obviously, all government policies should be about fairness and no one should be treated differently because their wealth flow. The commissioner has always said … that we’re looking at the work that was done for that unit, and obviously some mistakes were made,” de Blasio said when asked if he believed if the concealed carry permit process in New York is inclusive. “We want to make whatever reforms are necessary to make sure it is being done fairly, equitably — and no one who shouldn’t have guns should ever get a permit.”
Bratton also side-stepped the question of whether his police department has been fairly issuing concealed carry permits.
“We will continue, to the best of our ability, with the laws in this city and the laws in this state and the unfortunate very limited laws in the United States to try to keep the number of firearms in the city — pistols, long guns, to a very small number. That is the policy. Unfortunately, there are some in the department who chose to engage in criminal acts that violated the trust that you should have in how licenses are applied for and how licenses are granted,” he said.
Bratton also said more arrests may be on the way in relation to the department’s bribery scandal. De Blasio then praised congressional Democrats for staging a sit-in for more gun control laws.
“The commissioner has spoken about this for years and years that the NRA’s lock on the legislative process in Washington is unacceptable for this nation,” the mayor said. “This is one of the moments that NRA power is beginning to break down and what the House Democrats are doing in a very vivid fashion is saying, ‘no more.'”
“So my point in that is, I believe we are beginning to see a fundamental change on the national front.”