Students doubtful about increased NYPD presence after shootings

New York City public school students noticed increased NYPD presence on and around campuses, but questioned if it would really help, noting that “anything could still happen” amid a wave of violence outbursts.

On Thursday, The Post reported that Chief of Department Jeff Maddrey ordered all precincts to beef up their youth coordination officer (YCO) units following a spate of shootings and other violence near campuses.

“There are mad cops around,” a 16-year-old 11th grader at Williamsburg’s High School of Enterprise, Business, and Technology (EBT) told The Post Friday morning.

EBT is around the corner from East Williamsburg Scholars Academy, near where two teens were shot earlier this week.

On Friday, area around Scholars Academy and EBT was corralled by an NYPD school safety car, as well as a School Safety van.

Two NYPD SUVs marked “CRC” were also parked within view of the building, with another CRC SUV was stalled at Bushwick Ave and Maujer Street. 

Officers milling around the area wore vests emblazoned with “NYPD COUNTERTERRORISM,” and a school official with a radio stood at the door to greet students.

“They don’t go in the classrooms, they mostly stay in the hallways,” the EBT student said of the officers.

When asked if the increased law enforcement presence made her feel safer, she said, “not really.”

“It’s nice to have some protection,” she admitted, saying that she no longer hangs out where the two students from Scholars Academy were shot.

“But sh–t is gonna happen.”

Another 11th grader from EBT was similarly dubious about the cops’ ability to clamp down on violence near the schools.

“Anything could still happen,” he said.

“[Police] could be a deterrent, yes, but some…they don’t care. If they come to do what they want to do they are going to do it anyways,” he said of the perpetrators.

“They shot [a] security guard and two students,” he lamented, referring to the shooting this week outside Williamsburg Charter High School, which is about a 15-minute walk from his campus.

“That’s bad because it’s just hurting innocent people, innocent lives.”

The student, 17, said he was already at home when shots rang out around Scholars Academy, and he did not know the victims.

“It should have never happened. You should feel safe here,” he said of the incident.

“I want a safe community, a safe school.”

Later on Friday, after school was dismissed, a freshman girl from Scholars Academy told The Post that threats to the community were “not going to be better no matter many cops you have.”

“This is New York City. It is what it is,” she said.

The freshman also commented that she is friends with the male teen who was shot near the school this week.

“He is going to be OK,” she said.

Chelsey Velez, 31, a home attendant who lives in the area, spoke to The Post as she was picking up her 15-year-old nephew from Scholars Academy.

“Cops come only when something bad already happens. It should be a regular thing,” she said.

Unlike the students, Velez felt like the extra police presence would deter possible violence.

“If a student comes up the block and see a cop, maybe they’ll be like, ‘I’m not even going to mess with that school,” she posited.

Even so, Velez said, the ongoing violence in the area is making her reconsider her living arrangements.

“I’d love to move out of New York,” she said.

“Hopefully, soon, because I’m really sick of this.”

A business owner across the street from East Williamsburg Scholars Academy was also more optimistic about the cops’ presence– and was quick to blame the rising violence on “the new generation” of youngsters.

“[The students] are out of control so I’m not surprised,” the man, 44, said of this week’s shooting.

“I feel good that [the police] are around,” he said, noting that his own son, now 26, went to school in the area.

“I hope they will clear the area up and get the kids to go home– so it’s a good thing that they are here.”

The business owner claimed his store was losing money because students were hanging out in his doorway, smoking marijuana and detering would-be customers.

“People don’t want to come in where they see a bunch of kids hanging out in front of your business.  They are scared to come in,” he argued.

He alleged that a lot of the local kids are “in gangs” and flaunt guns in public.

“They have their gang signs up, it’s not like they are hiding it,” he said of the young people who frequent the neighborhood, though he did not elaborate on what those gang signs were.

“They think they are cool — being in a gang, having their gang signs up, shooting people. They are not even old enough to appreciate life,” he continued.

“It makes me feel sad. If this is our next generation, what’s the world coming to?”

The store owner also scoffed at the idea of lenient punishment for younger offenders.

“If you shoot somebody at 14 you should be charged as an adult. I believe you have a sense of what you are doing,” he said.

“You are shooting somebody, you are killing them. It’s not like breaking someone’s windshield.”