Why the N.Y.P.D. Dropped One of Its Oldest Crime-Fighting Tools
Officers’ most-used item since the 1800s isn’t the gun or handcuffs, but the handwritten activity log. Now an iPhone app is replacing it.
For more than a century, the New York City Police Department has required its officers to keep a detailed, handwritten memo book while on patrol.
“It’s basically our bible,” said Officer Ramses Cruz, who joined a platoon of officers writing down patrol assignments in oversize black leather binders at a recent afternoon roll call at the 90th Precinct Station House in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
Corey Kilgannon, NY TImes