New York City police officers’ investigations of local Muslims can be considered a violation of First Amendment rights, under new proposed modifications of New York Police Department guidelines.

The guidelines are a set of rules for law enforcement to abide by when conducting investigations into certain unlawful activity.

The NYPD investigative guideline changes come at a time amid a rash of ISIS-inspired attacks on law enforcement and civilians in America.

The modification of the guidelines is a result of what is required by as part of a settlement of lawsuits accusing the NYPD of improperly investigating Muslim groups. Although the city did not admit “to engaging in any improper practices, the changes represent an effort to provide more detailed guidance to NYPD personnel within the existing Handschu Guidelines,” New York Mayor Bill de Blasio’s office said.

The mayor’s office added, “These include explicitly incorporating police policies against religious profiling, adding a provision for considering the impact investigations have on people who are not targets of investigations, establishing reasonable time limits for certain investigations, and adding a civilian member to an internal NYPD Handschu Committee.”

“As part of the settlement, the NYPD has also agreed to remove from its website the 2007 report ‘Radicalization in the West,’ which the NYPD does not and never has relied upon to open or extend investigations.”

The guideline referencing protection of Constitutional rights added the language:

“[C]are be exercised in the conduct of those investigations so as to protect constitutional rights, including the right to be free from investigation in which race, religion, or ethnicity is a substantial or motivating factor.”

And, “that investigations not intrude upon rights of expression or association in a manner that discriminates on the basis of race, religion or ethnicity, where such discrimination is a substantial or motivating factor for the investigation.”

Read the article “NYPD Handbook Restricts Investigations on Persons’ Religion” on dailycaller.com.