Final Reflection: An NYPD Summer

Last week as I packed up my desk and began to say goodbye to all the talented attorneys I have worked with this summer I realized how grateful I was for the opportunity to intern with the Legal Bureau of the New York City Police Department. The six weeks I spent working with and learning from all these individuals was exactly the opportunity I was hoping to find when I began my internship search. I not only was able to explore a potential career path that has always interested me but was also was able to hone professional skills as well learn new skills altogether. As I consider what I had hoped to take away from this experience prior to beginning and as I now look back in contemplation at its conclusion I truly believe I completed many of the goals I sought out to accomplish.

When beginning my internship I was immediately intimidated by my fellow interns for they had all began interning several weeks before I did. While I knew this fact going into my first day, it did not make it an easier pill to swallow when I saw firsthand the rapport the interns had already developed amongst themselves as I was being introduced. This was soon compounded by the fact I was one of only three undergraduate interns with the Legal Bureau’s summer internship program. That first day I could not help but feel like the under-qualified new kid on the block; a feeling that felt foreign. As I settled in during my first week and was given my desk for the summer I soon realized that if I did not make an effort that I would end up spending a very isolated six weeks in the corner of the Police Action Litigation office. Over the course of the next week I began to strike up conversation with the attorneys and law school interns in my office. This was not easy task given I felt like the under-qualified new kid on the block, yet I soon realized attorneys and interns alike were more than welcoming. Further, many of these individuals took an interest in my future legal career and began to give insightful advice throughout the course of the summer. One thing I spoke about in my personal plan paper was the importance of effective networking. This experience, while not exactly what I had in mind when writing about networking, taught me a valuable lesson that will stay with me in many future networking opportunities. The lesson I learned being that often times the only person holding us back from sparking the conversation with someone who we are interested in speaking with is ourselves.In none of those first encounters did I feel my conversation was bothersome to the other individual, with the vast majority being warmly accepted and appreciated. Going forward I will approach these dry introductions, whether it be meeting new coworkers or networking at an event, with a hopeful optimism for a meaningful connection.

As I first began work Bridget, the woman who became my unspoken supervisor, gave me daily tasks that I was to complete every morning when I came in as well two summer-long projects I was to continuously contribute to until the end of my internship. As other tasks and projects were assigned it was assumed I would also find the time to complete these summer-long daily tasks and projects. I wrote in my personal plan paper that over the course of my internship I hoped to improve my planning and prioritizing of work. Unfortunately, at school I find myself procrastinating more than I would like, however this summer I made a dedicated conscious effort to completing work proactively. An example that best demonstrates this was the cataloging of a particular Youtube channel’s videos for a window of time. These videos were often cell phone videos recorded by third party individuals who witnessed NYPD officers making arrests that required force. The office I worked in handled the notices of claim against these officers in the videos; this is why my supervisors wanted text breakdowns of what can be observed in these videos so they could quickly go through the many videos. Originally I was supposed to write these descriptions for the videos that were uploaded during a specific period of time. However, during the beginning of my third week I realized new videos were being uploaded with many of them being what I deemed susceptible to future litigation against the NYPD. When I found myself without work to be done I began proactively cataloging these videos. Eventually about a week later my supervisor asked if I could write the descriptions for all the newly posted videos after the originally given timeframe. My supervisor was thrilled when I was able to tell her that I was one step ahead. This effective time management not only left my supervisor incredibly impressed but also made me the recipient of more frequent and intensive assignments. The increase in workload meant that time management was even more important and that I needed to continue reinforcing the strong habits of planning and prioritizing my work effectively. This summer internship allowed me to improve tremendously on a skill that I sought to months ago.

Despite the many courses I have taken that actively aim to improve my writing ability, none had ever prepared me for writing using legalese. As I wrote in my site description paper, I hoped to learn how to understand and write in this legal writing. At first reading court documents full of this legalese was painstakingly time-consuming as many words required google searches, however with the help of nearby attorneys and law school interns digesting this material soon became a much quicker feat. I actually was given a copy of Black’s Law Dictionary by one of the attorneys who I worked closely with who told me that when she interned with a law firm as an undergraduate that she would simply flip through the pages of the dictionary trying to learn new words everyday. This became something I did throughout the summer when I found. When considering this goal I set out to accomplish, learning to write and understand legalese, I believe that I have been successful.

This summer I sought to develop a deep understanding of what a career in the legal field might entail as well determine if that might be something I would like to pursue. This understanding was both mentioned in my personal contribution paper as well as my learning contract. I considered this understanding of a legal career to be the most important thing that I walked away from my internship with. I felt this way for this understanding would ultimately have the largest effect on my post-graduation life. Thankfully as an undergraduate who had not yet committed to the legal profession, many of the individuals who I interacted with at work shed valuable insights on the matter. Whether it be through explaining what steps they took to prepare for the LSAT, expressing the woes of their life as law school students, or describing the work they typically did as an agency attorney I was given all the information that I could have hoped for. I left this internship feeling reassured in my decision to wait a year after graduation before beginning law school as a result of the many attorneys who told me that was exactly what they did.

This summer did not only provide ample opportunity to hone my skills and learn more about the legal profession but it also reinforced some of the theory that I have studied as a Jepson student. The rather small size of the office I worked in allowed me to learn all about the hierarchal dynamic of the Police Action Litigation sector. Whether it was directly dealing with my supervisors or watching how the agency’s executive director dealt with each attorney I could witness actual leader-follower relationships. Further, with these relationships I was able to think back on my time in Jepson classrooms and apply theories to my daily life.

As I have noted on several occasions the NYPD is a massive entity with many agents. Even the Legal Bureau of the NYPD has many agents, hence why it is split into several sectors. All these sectors accomplish different tasks on behalf of the NYPD and thus operate independently of one another to best accomplish their respective goals. While I spent the vast majority of my time with the Police Action Litigation sector I did also spend some time on the top floor of 1 Police Plaza with the Civil sector of the Legal Bureau. As I noted in my first blog post there was a distinct difference in how these two sectors were led. Upon this realization my Jepson education kicked in and I considered what might be the cause of this. As I wrote in that first blog post, I believed this to be the result of the contingency theory in effect. The leader-follower relationship on the top floor, where the situations I have learned are far more high-pressure and deadline sensitive, was quite task-oriented. This was great for the 3L law school interns who wanted as much practical experience as possible. However, in my case the ideal sector was the Police Action Litigation sector. PAL’s focus on identifying trends and potential lawsuits made it far less deadline-oriented and much more open to collaboration amongst coworkers. I witnessed much more relationship-oriented leader-follower relationships as a result of these factors. By understanding the contingency theory I was able to understand how to best mesh myself into the office quickly and effectively. I focused on establishing a rapport with my supervisors and as a result gained valuable insights and was assigned interesting projects. If I had spent more time in Civil my focus might have shifted to demonstrating that I myself was quite task-oriented.

I witnessed during my internship how a subordinate’s behavior can be altered immediately once given a position of power. I also discussed this observation in a blog post.  What I saw was not an employee becoming power-hungry and abusing their new power, rather I saw a highly personable attorney become more stern just like their predecessor. Through my time in Jepson I understood this shift to be the normalizing of a leader to the typical behavior of the predecessor. This was a behavior we discussed in Dr. Von Rueden’s class when examining the presidents and how often they act just like the presidents before them.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time interning with the Legal Bureau this summer and will hold the many lessons and skills learned closely as I prepare for life after graduation. I went into this summer with a knowledge of the legal career mainly based off of John Grisham novels and television shows like Suits. However, I now look back on this transformative six weeks spent at 1 Police Plaza with a greater understanding than I could have ever asked for. While I am not sure that government, specifically police department, law is what I hope to pursue with my career, I could not have asked for better summer mentors to guide me into what will be the next chapter of my life: law school. I also have realized how truly multi-disciplinary a Jepson education is. Without the leadership classes I have already taken there is no possibility I walk away from my summer internship with all the information I gained over these past six weeks.