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Lawyers seek docs on NYPD unit that eyed Muslims

Civil liberties groups are asking a judge to force the New York Police Department to turn over documents about its efforts to spy on and infiltrate the Muslim community.

The documents filed in federal court in Manhattan are based largely on reporting from The Associated Press that showed police monitoring all aspects of daily life in Muslim neighborhoods. Documents showed that plainclothes officers were being dispatched to eavesdrop inside businesses. Hundreds of mosques were investigated. Dozens were infiltrated. And police maintained a list of 28 countries that, along with “American Black Muslim,” were labeled “ancestries of interest.”

Lawyers said that could violate a longstanding court order prohibiting the NYPD from maintaining information on people not involved with criminal activity. The NYPD didn’t immediately respond to a message for comment.