ST. GEORGE — Arguments in a lawsuit challenging the city's right to delete information gathered when people apply for IDNYC closed Wednesday.
A judge is expected to rule on the case next month.
Judge Philip Minardo heard the final testimony in the lawsuit filed by two Republican assembly members who want to force the city to retain the information.
Among people called on the final day were Sergeants Benevolent Association president Ed Mullins.
He told the judge that the information used to apply for the municipal ID cards was a valuable tool for investigators and could help them track down suspects in crimes.
"These underlining documents that give him an ID may help us find where he is or give us a starting point," said Mullins about applicants who police may later try to trace.
"Any tool that helps facilitate the successful end of an investigation is of value to us. We're really putting a cap on something that maybe we shouldn't be."
Assembly members Ron Castorina Jr. and Nicole Malliotakis sued the city to retain the documents used to apply for the municipal identification cards after Mayor Bill de Blasio threatened to purge the information to shield undocumented immigrants from the federal government.
Minardo previously ordered the city to retain the data while the lawsuit was considered.
Lawyers for Castorina and Malliotakis argued that deleting the data would violate the state's Freedom of Information Law and create a security risk because it would make it impossible to trace people who used the card.
Despite their concerns, one of the city's counterterrorism experts previously testified that keeping the data poses a security risk itself.
"Anything that lives on a server can and will be breached," the NYPD's Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence and Counterterrorism John Miller said during a Jan. 5 hearing.
"It could lead to a massive identity fraud operation."
Mullins — who has no experience working for the NYPD terror divisions — said that personal information of city workers is kept on similar databases.
Lawyers for the city repeatedly pointed to the fact that the application itself — which gathers information like home addresses — is retained by the city. It's supporting documents, such as passports and utility bills, that it wants to erase.
Castorina previously testified he was concerned terrorists could get an IDNYC card and use it to open up bank accounts to fund their operations.
But banking veteran John Burnett, who ran for Comptroller in 2013 on the Republican ticket, testified in court Wednesday that the IDNYC doesn't have enough weight to be considered a primary ID to open up a bank account.
De Blasio launched the IDNYC program in 2015 to give identification cards to residents who have trouble obtaining regular ID, such as undocumented immigrants, the formerly incarcerated and transgender people.
There have been more than 900,000 applications since it launched. The city has investigated 102 cases alleging fraud and confirmed just four, which involved people using bogus identities to get the cards, officials said.
