NYPD working as domestic intelligence agency, report says - NYPOST.com

* Cops flooded Pakistani neighborhoods to recruit informants, by first busting them on traffic stops and outstanding warrants, then using the arrests as leverage.

* The CIA trained a top NYPD detective at its famed Farm spy school in Virginia, and a top CIA officer, a former Middle East station chief, is assigned to One Police Plaza.

* NYPD intelligence officers have spied on people far beyond New York City borders.

Police spokesman Paul Browne ripped the report, saying it is "marked by outright fiction, denying the use of the term "mosque crawler."

Still, he sharply defended the program.

"We don't apologize for it, and we're not deterred by petty jealousies that success sometimes breeds," he said.

Even those involved have reservations about maintaining the balance between security and civil liberties.

"Some in the department, including lawyers, have privately expressed concerns about the program," said the AP story, which was based on interviews of 40 current and former cops and feds.

Before 9/11, the NYPD's intel team did little more than aid in security for dignitaries.

But Police Commissioner Ray Kelly determined the city couldn't rely on the feds to protect the city and tapped a former CIA deputy commissioner for intelligence, David Cohen, in 2002 to create the anti-terror intel unit from scratch.

Taking advantage of New York's diversity, he had undercover officers visit mosques, bookstores, hookah bars and cafes while also targeting cabbies and food-cart vendors -- who tend to hail from Muslim countries.

Undercover officers also attended mosque sermons. They were dubbed "rakers" because they "raked the coals" looking for hot spots.

Cops assigned to the undercover squad were deputized as federal marshals, allowing them to operate in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts.

"One of the hallmarks of the intelligence division over the last 10 years is that, not only has it gotten extremely aggressive and sophisticated, but it's operating on its own," warned Chris Dunn, of the New York City Civil Liberties Union. "There are no checks. There is no oversight."