Categories for News

Jul 30

2025

Another bad review for ICE’s Batavia detention center

Published by

For a third time in the past two years, federal inspectors have found that guards at the local ICE detention center in Batavia improperly used force against the immigrants held there. Investigative Post in February reported on two recent federal audits that found incidents where officers were quick to use pepper spray and manhandle detainees instead of deescalating tense situations. Now, a June report from the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general found two additional instances where guards violated the use-of-force policy against detainees. On one occasion, a detainee was locked in his cell, handcuffed. Officers arrived to remove the[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Jul 29

2025

What’s next for Chris Scanlon

Published by

There has been much chatter about Acting Mayor Chris Scanlon’s plans come January, when he will relinquish his job as the city’s interim chief executive to the winner of November’s general election. Will Scanlon serve the two years left in his current term as South District Council member? Will he seek another elected office, perhaps in the state Legislature? Or will he leave elected office behind — at least for now — and take some well-paying job in state government or the private sector? Scanlon on Friday told an Investigative Post reporter he’s “heard the rumors” and insisted there’s nothing[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Jul 25

2025

Buffalo lawmaker joins call for police oversight

Published by

Leah Halton-Pope at a Buffalo Common Council meeting. Buffalo Common Council Majority Leader Leah Halton-Pope is keeping alive her predecessor’s call for reforms to the Buffalo Police Department, including the creation of a civilian oversight board with the power to investigate claims of officer misconduct and recommend discipline. That makes Halton-Pope the third city lawmaker to express support for civilian oversight of policer, joining the University District’s Rasheed Wyatt and Masten District’s Zeneta Everhart. Halton-Pope, who represents the Ellicott District, submitted a resolution last week that re-ups and refreshes police reforms proposed four years ago by former Common Council President[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Jul 24

2025

A pay raise already for Byron Brown at OTB

Published by

On the job less than a year, Byron Brown has already secured himself a raise at the Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corp. Brown, hired as new president and CEO last fall, won a 3 percent raise Thursday, bringing his total pay to $303,850. That’s ahead of a contractual $10,000 raise scheduled to take effect in January, which will carry Brown’s total pay to nearly $314,000. Five other corporation officials were also granted 3 percent raises by a unanimous vote of OTB’s board. The raise Thursday solidifies Brown as the highest paid OTB leader across New York. The next-highest paid OTB[...]

Posted 2 months ago

Jul 23

2025

More delays in creating Buffalo Housing Court panel

Published by

Plans to reinstate the Buffalo Housing Court Advisory Council — which, despite being written into law, has been inactive for over three decades — seem to have stalled yet again.  The state judicial system says not enough people have shown interest in joining the council, which is intended to monitor Housing Court, make recommendations to the judge, hold quarterly meetings and produce annual reports.  Meanwhile, community members say the courts have done a poor job of advertising the search for applicants. “It shouldn’t be shocking that you don’t get a lot of applicants if you don’t actually make the position[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Jul 22

2025

Migrant crossings on our northern border

Published by

Border patrol surveillance cameras at Fort Niagara State Park. Photo by Tina MacIntyre-Yee/Democrat and Chronicle. By the time four people paddled halfway across the Niagara River in an inflatable raft one night in 2024, a surveillance camera had already picked them out of the winter darkness. The image was gray and pixelated, their raft a single speck of black in the mouth of the river. Several miles away, a U.S. Border Patrol agent sat behind a dozen or more monitors and counted as four people stepped onto land. The camera followed the migrants to the shore in Lewiston, while agents[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Jul 15

2025

Another Buffalo cop cited for misconduct

Published by

The state attorney general’s office has determined another Buffalo police officer abused his authority through his use of excessive force and other misdeeds.   The AG’s office reviewed 14 complaints made against Officer Justin Ayala between October 2021 and August of last year. The findings were based on five incidents, including his punching of a man while held down by other officers, pepper-spraying a handcuffed suspect, and use of vile language on a teen-age girl and her mother. The office of Letitia James also took issue with the department’s investigations into Ayala’s conduct, arguing the department erred in exonerating him in[...]

Posted 3 months ago

Jul 8

2025

Lawsuit seeks environmental review of STAMP data center

Published by

Chief Roger Hill, a Tonawanda Seneca Nation leader, looks out to Plug Power site. Photo by Garrett Looker. The Tonawanda Seneca Nation is again suing the builders of the Genesee County STAMP industrial park, arguing in a lawsuit filed last week that the industrial development agency failed to conduct a proper environmental review for a large data center. The lawsuit asks a judge to issue a temporary restraining order to halt any prep work being done for the data center, and eventually to rule that additional environmental reviews are needed before the project can proceed. The Nation and the Sierra[...]

Posted 3 months ago
Investigative Post