The head of the NYPD’s Lieutenants Benevolent Association has slammed New York City’s progressive laws and policies that are hamstringing the police from keeping violent criminals locked up, saying the Big Apple effectively has what amounts to a “catch-and-release” policy for dangerous offenders.

Lou Turco, the president of the police union, made the comments in an interview with Fox News Digital in the wake of a mob of illegal immigrants viciously attacking two NYPD officers – with several of the cop-beating suspects bolting from the state after being arrested and then released.

Turco said the whole incident – including the beat-down, the arrests and releases, the lack of deportations as well as a migrant flipping the bird to reporters – is a microcosm of what’s going on every day in the city. 

“Unfortunately, we’re not surprised that they skipped town and that’s the thing that’s so disheartening because they gave no bail to people who have no community ties whatsoever to New York,” Turco said. 

“We stop the transparency when an arrest is made. Nobody knows anything about prosecution and incarceration. We don’t keep track of any of those numbers or they don’t make them public at least,” Turco said.

Turco said the lack of transparency in these instances doesn’t stem from legislation, rather than a lack of motivation from city officials.

“It’s because there’s no will to do it, because the will is to not have anybody incarcerated and have nobody held accountable for crime. That’s the will.”

Reforms to policing, prosecutions and incarceration in New York City have largely been driven by progressive ideology over the last decade, with the deep-blue city having an unshakable Democratic majority. Of the 51-member council, 45 are Democrats, while New York City Mayor Eric Adams is also a Democrat, although Turco said the mayor is also being held back by the law.

In the latest piece of progressive policing legislation, the City Council passed a law last week that will require the NYPD to record the race, gender and age of most people they stop for questioning in an effort to reduce racial profiling. 

Adams, a former NYPD captain, tried to veto the bill, arguing it could slow NYPD response times, undermine community-oriented policing and add tens of millions of dollars in overtime to the NYPD budget.

Turco agrees with the mayor, arguing that the City Council members have no experience of policing. 

Two migrants, pictured, who stomped and kicked two police officers during the vicious Times Square attack late last month have yet to be arrested and are still at large, according to the NYPD. (NYPD )

“You have people that never put a vest on, never did the job making determinations and they don’t take any advice or input from the mayor who did this job before. They went completely against him,” Turco said. 

“I don’t know where all of this goes, we’re going down slowly. It’s death by a thousand cuts.”

“They keep making more and more legislation that makes no sense whatsoever. They don’t look at the victims, they really don’t. They don’t take victims seriously.”

“They want to protect the perpetrator and I don’t understand why.”