Results tagged “stopandfrisk”

After the NYCLU called attention to a record-breaking number of NYPD stop and frisks for the first three months of 2009, the department's spokesman is out defending the stats [pdf], which reveal—shocker—a continued emphasis on targeting blacks and Latinos. And at the going rate, the NYPD will stop and frisk 626,767 suspects in 2009, which would shatter the current record of 531,159, set in 2008. But police spokesman Paul J. Browne reassures the Times, "In a city where police make 400,000 arrests annually based on the higher standard of probable cause, 500,000 stops annually is not unreasonable...We believe that there is a relationship between stops and crime prevention, although you can't document crimes that did not occur as a result of stops involving suspicious activity." Ah, he has us with that koan, which is sort of like the sound of one hand cuffing. Councilman Peter Vallone, Jr. also has the NYPD's back, telling reporters, "Stop and frisks have been going up for the past three years and the reason is because they work." The Constitution's nice and quaint, but whatever works, right?

Because of the NYPD's abiding commitment to self-transcendence in the fields of racial profiling and constitutional violation, the department has beat its own lofty record for the number of reported stop and frisk interrogations in three months. According to a data revealed today [pdf] at the NYCLU's insistence, the NYPD stopped and searched more innocent people during the first three months of 2009 than during any three-month period since police began collecting data on the program.

During a press conference to introduce the NYPD's new fleet of hybrid patrol cars, Commissioner Ray Kelly revealed a new addition to the department's controversial "stop and frisk" repertoire: Explaining. The new policy, which went into effect last week, requires any officer stopping a person in the street for a pat-down to divulge "the reason, or reasons, why it occurred." And in a pilot program being tested in Harlem, the South Bronx, and East New York, the subject of the search will also be given a 3-by-5-inch card explaining why the stop and frisk is so not racial profiling.

An unidentified rookie NYPD officer shot 18-year-old Akeem Harvey in the face yesterday after the teen ran from officers during a "stop and frisk" outside a corner store in Brownsville. Police sources tell the Daily News that Harvey "acted nervous and kept adjusting his waistband" when police approached him at approximately 2:30 p.m. near Winthrop Avenue and East 93rd Street. Harvey then bolted and started running toward his home, but the police say he "fumbled" and dropped his .357-magnum revolver (pictured, via MyFox NY).

Despite the high percentages of minorities frisked among the hundreds of thousands stopped and questioned by the NYPD, the Daily News reports that very few are getting hit with any charges with ones as serious as criminal possession of a weapon accounting for just a fraction of those arrested. Their latest analysis comes from data released by the Center for Constitution Rights as part of their lawsuit accusing the NYPD of racial profiling. The News talks to one college student of mixed race who was stopped because the officer said he "looked like he had a gun on him" and his charges of disorderly conduct stemming from what the cop deemed "furtive actions" and "inappropriate attire" were eventually dropped when the officer failed to show up to a court date. NYPD spokeman Paul Browne defended the stop to arrest ratio saying, "Twenty individuals may be stopped and briefly questioned because they fit the general description. But only one [and maybe none] is eventually arrested."

The Center for Constitution Rights analyzed NYPD data between 2005 and the first half of 2008 and found, "approximately 80 percent of total stops made were of Blacks and Latinos, who comprise 25 percent and 28 percent of New York City’s total population, respectively. During this same time period, only approximately 10 percent of stops were of Whites, who comprise 44 percent of the city’s population."

The New York Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit accusing the city and NYPD of racial profiling on behalf of a NY Post reporter who was "stopped, arrested and jailed without justification" last November.

The Daily News put together a map detailing the number of stop-and-frisks on the subway - and the racial breakdown of these stop-and-frisks. As the accompanying article makes clear (as well as interviews with people who have been stopped - 1, 2) how cops can stop anyone , though black and Hispanic riders make up about half of the subway riding population, 88% percent of the people stopped are black or Hispanic. The NYPD told the News, "Subway crime is down, in part, because of stops. Officers make stops based on reasonable suspicion, and the numbers reflect the times, places and circumstances where those observations take place."