Team Roc Lawsuit Accuses Kansas City Police Department of Hiding Misconduct

Team Roc has hit the Kansas City, Kansas police department with a lawsuit for misconduct in an attempt to acquire complaints about the police department’s behavior.

Lawyers for Jay-Z’s philanthropic group wrote in the filing that “for decades, members of the KCKPD abused their positions of power and authority to solicit and coerce fabricated witness statements and testimony, plant evidence, procure sexual favors, withhold exculpatory evidence, and conceal their own misconduct and ignore the misconduct of others.”

Team Roc’s suit claims the department declined to share records regarding the alleged misconduct of officers.

The lawsuit continues, saying the department “refused to produce documents relating to any internal investigations into wrongdoing by specific members of the KCKPD, preventing the public from evaluating whether the KCKPD has adequately supervised its officers, investigated any complaints, and addressed the allegations of misconduct against members of its force.”

The filing points to a number of examples of alleged misconduct. One such incident involves an officer who was reportedly charged with “buying sexual relations” this year. In 2020, another officer was reportedly charged with sex crimes linked to a minor.

“Allowing the public to obtain information about the scope and scale of the misconduct within the KCKPD will help ensure that the KCKPD is subject to scrutiny and oversight by the community that it is supposed to protect and defend,” the lawsuit says.

Last year, Team Roc extended its philanthropic efforts to uncover the cruel conditions that inmates were subjected to at a Mississippi prison, particularly in relation to healthcare.