A Suffolk County police officer says New York needs stronger legal protections for law enforcement after a man he arrested later showed up outside his house with a billboard truck and, he says, harassed his family.
Louis Civello, president of the Suffolk County Police Benevolent Association, described the incident Tuesday at a New York State Public Safety Alliance event pushing for new legal safeguards for officers and other local public employees.
Civello said he arrested a protester for trespassing in early 2026 after the man showed up at his office. That, Civello said, wasn’t the end of it.
“Well, that wasn’t enough for this individual,” Civello said. “He then decided he was going to find my address, came to my home with a billboard truck. That’s how much money these people are making. They can buy billboard trucks.”
Civello argued there was no legitimate reason for the man to come to his home, noting that Suffolk County has seven police precincts where someone could protest instead.
“You only come to my home to terrorize my family, to get at me via my wife and my children,” Civello said.
He said the episode was not an isolated incident but part of a pattern his family has faced, and he used it to argue that New York’s current privacy protections for police are insufficient.
“The laws are woefully inadequate, and they’re gonna get worse if we don’t work to fix them,” he said.
Civello said there is currently no law barring someone from waiting outside an officer’s home or publishing an officer’s address, which he said can be found online with minimal effort.
“Right now, no law against it. No law against coming to my house. So if you are a rapist, and I as a police officer arrest you, you can sit at the edge of my driveway and greet my wife as she comes home. No law against it. No law is publishing my address. If you want to look me up, look any police officer up, look any of us up, it’s a few clicks of a mouse,” he said.
Civello called for New York to pass an anti-doxxing law and asked why the state hasn’t adopted a version of Florida’s so-called “Halo Law,” which protects first responders from harassment after they issue a warning to an individual.
“Why don’t have an anti-doxxing law? Why don’t we have laws that make sense?” Civello asked.
Other unions join the call
Civello wasn’t alone in pressing for change. Scott Munro, president of the Detectives’ Endowment Association, asked for a buffer zone around officers.
“All we’re asking for is fifteen foot. Fifteen foot, that’s all we’re asking for, for safety reasons,” Munro said.
Munro said the New York State Public Safety Alliance now includes 99 unions, representing firefighters, traffic agents, sanitation enforcement agents, environmental police, bus drivers and others.
“Those people get assaulted every day. Assaults are up, almost 2,500 assaults this year alone on police officers, felony assaults, and public servants in New York City. That’s what’s going on,” Munro said.
Fox News Digital, which first reported the comments, said it contacted the Suffolk County Police Benevolent Association and the Detectives’ Endowment Association, which runs the alliance, for further comment.
