Stop And Frisk

Submitted By Bre-Mitchell
Words: 723
Pages: 3

Latricia Harvey
Professor Cannon
Stop, Question and Frisk

Stop, Question and Frisk have become a recurring issue in society as it is stated that the attitude of law enforcement in conducting this procedure is unethical which reduces the integrity of police and community relation, creating an upheaval. It is believed that these law enforcement officers are conducting stop and frisk based on racial profiling. Stop Question and Frisk is the situation in which a police officer who is suspicious of an individual detains the person and run his hands lightly over the suspect’s outer garments to determine if the person is carrying a concealed weapon. A reasonable suspicion is required for law enforcement to search the pedestrian if the pedestrian in question committed, is committing, or is about to commit a felony or a Penal Law misdemeanor. The vast majority of those stops conducted were of Black or Hispanic people in which is stated as racial discrimination which is viewed by the public as law enforcement corruption and highly unfair. in support of this, statistics have shown that in 2011, the NYPD recorded roughly 685,00 in which in which 52% of these individuals were Black and 31% were Hispanic (Stop, Question and Frisk Study)
The 1968 landmark case, Terry v Ohio has addressed the issue of unreasonable search and seizure protected by the Fourth amended which led to the legal procedure of Stop and Frisk. Stop and Frisk are considerably less intrusive than full blown arrest and searches. Furthermore, it is an essential proactive factor for crime prevention and as it relates to police safety it is crucial that police have some leeway to act before full probable cause have developed. Also, the Fourth Amendment’s reasonableness requirement is sufficiently flexible to permit an officer to investigate the situation.
Stop Questions and Frisk tends to be conducted in hotspots; these are areas that are prone to high crime rate, whereas, the Black and Hispanic population makes up majority of these areas. This states that this legal procedure is not directed to target these ethnic population, however, these individuals are commonly associated with these densely crime impacted areas where stop and frisk concentrates highly within. The crimes rate is significant in determining stop and frisk, so the identification of the race effects suggests that racial composition has a marginal influence on stops, over and above the unique contributions of crime.
Stop, Question and Frisk have stated to have an emotional toll on residents due to the increase of the suspicion-less stop and frisks per year. It is believe that less than 6% of these stop and frisk resulted in arrest and less than 1% produce guns. This process have immensely stigmatized an oppressed population which is viewed by critics as a slow genocide where these Black or Hispanic population are targeted to be put away due to the unethical racial profiling by law enforcement official in conducting stop and frisk.