Getting Frisky, Part II

Dsch67

In May we had a post about the NYPD Stop and Frisk program, here is an update on that story.

US District Court for the Southern District of New York

Judge Scheindlin concluded that the stops, which soared in number over the last decade as crime continued to decline, demonstrated a widespread disregard for the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures by the government, as well as the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause. 

After officers stopped people, they often conducted frisks for weapons, or searched the subjects’ pockets for contraband, like drugs, without any legal grounds for doing so. Also, she found that during police stops, blacks and Hispanics “were more likely to be subjected to the use of force than whites, despite the fact that whites are more likely to be found with weapons or contraband."

Roughly 80% of the stops involve blacks and Hispanics, yet over 90% of the stops produce no summons or arrest.

Nanny Bloomberg freaks out

“Crime can come back anytime the criminals think that they’re going to get away with things. We just cannot let that happen... You’re not going to see any change in tactics overnight. I wouldn’t want to be responsible for a lot of people dying."

He does however have no problem being responsible for a lot of people being oppressed by having their constitutional rights routinely and repeatedly violated.

The Judge went on to say

“I also conclude that the city’s highest officials have turned a blind eye to the evidence that officers are conducting stops in a racially discriminatory manner,”

"The NYPD's practice of making stops that lack individualized reasonable suspicion has been so pervasive and persistent as to become not only a part of the NYPD's standard operating procedure, but a fact of daily life in some New York City neighborhoods." 

And it is off to the US Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit

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