In the wake of the death of Freddie Grey in 2015, the New York City Police Department made a decision to migrate the transportation of prisoners away from the older metal cages that had been in use for several decades. 

They wanted a custom designed prisoner transport that would be based on the newer style cargo vans that had recently been released by Ford, Sprinter, Ram, and Nissan.  The objective was to create a vehicle that would be much safer to transport the detained, safer for the officers to load and unload the prisoners, and provide digital recordings of the prisoner compartment and the exit, as well as other requirements. 

Vehicle Leasing Associates was approached to design and build a fleet of these next-generation prisoner transport vans.  VLA partnered with Mobility Works, a leading company in the handicapped accessible transportation field, to design a van that fit all of the requested objectives as well as crash test the vehicle to ensure that the seating configuration passes all National Highway Safety Standards. 

Over two years, and multiple designs, the fleet of vans started going into service in Q1 2017.