Police official defends destruction of municipal ID records
NEW YORK — A police official on Thursday defended the city’s intention to destroy personal records of holders of its immigrant-friendly municipal ID cards.
John Miller, deputy commissioner of intelligence and counterterrorism, testified in a courtroom that the ID is not a terrorist tool and that few people have tried to obtain it fraudulently or use it to commit crimes during the two years since it was first issued.
“Criminal implications over the trial period were de minimis,” Miller said.
The identification cards are available to any New York City resident but were aimed particularly at people without other forms of ID, including the estimated 500,000 immigrants living illegally in the city, the nation’s biggest.