Police Officer Maintains $113k Job After Multiple Misconduct Findings

A Buffalo Police Officer with a documented pattern of misconduct has been cited by the New York State Attorney General’s Office following a comprehensive review of citizen complaints. Officer Justin Ayala, 39, is the third Buffalo officer in less than a year to be formally cited for repeated abuse of authority by the Law Enforcement Misconduct Investigative Office, a watchdog agency created after the 2020 death of George Floyd.

Between October 2021 and August 2023, Ayala was the subject of 14 complaints from different individuals. State investigators examined five of those cases in detail, concluding that Ayala repeatedly used excessive force and engaged in other inappropriate behavior.

Incidents included punching a man held by other officers, pepper-spraying a handcuffed woman in a patrol car, and verbally berating a teenage girl and her mother during a domestic dispute response.

Despite the troubling findings, Ayala remains employed by the Buffalo Police Department, earning over $113,000 last year, nearly $50,000 of which was in overtime pay. The Attorney General’s report also criticized the department’s internal investigations, highlighting that in multiple cases officers exonerated Ayala without reviewing key body camera footage.

One of the most troubling cases involved a 2020 arrest on Halloween in which Ayala and four other officers - Daniel Carson, Patrick Kinsella, Matthew Serafini, and Stephen Lesniak - pinned and beat Andy Ocasio, who was filming an unrelated arrest at a party.

According to a federal lawsuit and body-camera footage, Ayala punched Ocasio in the head twice while he was held down resulting in a fractured eye socket and a traumatic brain injury. Ocasio now suffers from vision impairment and PTSD. While police charged him with resisting arrest and drug possession, the case was later dropped.

The AG’s report determined that Ayala’s actions violated department policy and both federal and state constitutional protections. Officials concluded that Ocasio did not exhibit behavior that justified force under BPD’s definitions, which require aggression such as physical attacks or threats.

Further scrutiny of Ayala’s record uncovered additional misconduct. In May 2023, during a response to a domestic altercation between a mother and daughter, Ayala was recorded using profane language toward the teenage girl and her mother before physically throwing the teen to the ground.

The department labeled the incident as “other,” avoiding a misconduct designation and instead issued a minor corrective action.

The report also cited three other episodes in 2023 and 2024. These included Ayala’s one-day suspension in June 2023 for mishandling body camera protocol and obstructing an accident investigation, the pepper-spraying of a handcuffed detainee in July, and the deactivation of his camera during an unconstitutional frisk at a traffic stop in August 2024.

The Attorney General’s Office has issued five recommendations to the Buffalo Police Department including mandatory retraining and further disciplinary action against Ayala. The office also urged that an Internal Affairs supervisor be assigned to directly monitor Ayala, that his misconduct be considered during evaluations, and that the department revise its use of the ambiguous “other” classification when investigating officers.

The department has until September 18th to formally respond to the AG’s findings. Meanwhile, Ayala remains on active duty, and neither the department, the mayor’s office, nor the police union has issued a public statement regarding the case.

Police Officer Maintains $113k Job After Multiple Misconduct Findings