A photograph posted to social media showing four NYPD officers posing with a scantily-clad stripper has people asking a lot of questions.

The stripper, Jude Menelas (known on the stage as “Messiah”) posed with the four public servants at a Mother’s Day event at a senior center in Manhattan, the New York Post reports.

“I came out, danced around a bit. After that, I started taking pictures with all the elderly ladies, even the ladies in wheelchairs and with oxygen tanks,” Menelas said. “I was about to leave, and the officers said, ‘Can we take a picture?’ And that was that.” 

Except, that wasn’t that.

Once the picture hit social media, the officers were criticized for being unprofessional.

And Sergeant Jessica McRorie, a spokesperson for the department, said the officers didn’t ask for a picture.

According to McRorie, “The senior center participants encouraged the officers to pose for the picture.”

An NYPD spokesperson added, “Our officers were not aware that the males in the photo would be present at this event.”

However, several people the Post spoke to about the event disagreed with this official statement. 

One claimed the fact strippers would be present was advertised “well in advance” of the celebration. Another said, “The job knew they would be there.”

The officers were at the event as it has become customary for representatives from the department to attend the senior center’s Mother’s Day party.

It isn’t clear whether or not the officers in the photo will be punished.

McRorie said, “The commanding officer is aware and will address the incident at the precinct level.”

All of the officers in the photo are female; male officers who have taken similar photos with female dancers in the past have faced discipline.