NYC NOW - August 14, 2023 : Evening Roundup

Episode Date: August 14, 2023

It’s been 10 years since a federal judge ordered the NYPD to make sweeping changes to its use of pedestrian stops, after finding they were illegally targeting people of color. WNYC’s Tiffany Hanssen talks with former Judge Shira Schiendlin, who ruled that “stop-and-frisk” was unconstitutional. Plus, WNYC's Community Partnerships Desk shares voices from residents in Washington Heights.

Good evening and welcome to NYC Now. I'm Junae Pierre for WNYC. It's been a decade since the NYPD's controversial stop-and-frisk policy was ruled unconstitutional. The practice was a hallmark of policing in New York during the Giuliani administration and hit its peak under former Mayor Mike Bloomberg and his police commissioner Ray Kelly when nearly 700,000 pedestrians were stopped in 2011. But in 2013, Judge Shira Shinlan ordered the police department to make major changes to prevent people from being stopped and searched illegally. She compared the practice

to drilling in a dry well. The stops did not produce drugs, did not produce guns, did not produce evidence of crimes. It was just an intrusion into people's freedom to walk about without being harassed by police. Pedestrian stops have declined substantially since then, but have recently crept up again. Shinlan is now retired and talked with WNYC's Tiffany Hansen. That conversation after the break. I just want to remind listeners exactly what was happening 10 years ago. So can you, before we talk about the ruling, just be in a picture of what was happening at the time in terms of stop and frisk in the NYPD? At that time, there were hundreds of thousands of stops per year.

And the police department would stop people without what I believe is reasonable suspicion to do so. And not only would they stop them, but they would often. frisk them. Most of these stops resulted in nothing. 88% I believe was the figure. The remainder had some follow-up, but often very minor. Maybe somebody who was stopped, it would turn out had a warrant or hadn't paid some fines or whatever, but that was a sideshow, so to speak. So it was not a very effective policy. In any event, a class action lawsuit was brought. It took years to get it tried. And there was a trial before me, and then there was a decision. It was a non-jury trial, so I was the only finder of the fact. So the efficacy of the policy aside,

I'm wondering, as it relates to this ruling, what about the policy did you find unconstitutional? The majority of the stops were disproportionately against black and Hispanic people. I don't have the figures in front of me now, but the evidence of trial. trial show that they were stopped out of proportion to their percentage in the population in New York. This led to the conclusion that there was a lot of racial profiling going on. The police targeted certain neighborhoods, targeted certain members of our society disproportionately. So the burden fell on black and Hispanic people. There was testimony at the trial that police were told.

Essentially, we need to stop the right people in the right places at the right time. There was testimony at the trial that very high up people in the police department said, we all know who's committing the crimes in New York. It's young black males. The perception in the police department was that these people are always armed and always ready to commit crimes. And if we stop, if we do these stops, they won't commit crimes. You talk about the evidence you heard at trial.

I want to know if there was anything you heard in favor of stop and frisk. that made you question your ruling at all? No, actually not. And after the ruling, the morning after, the mayor and the police commissioner and the city's corporation council said, oh, now the city's going to blow up with crime. And of course, I'm a human being and I was worried about that. But in reality, the exact opposite happened. The stops plummeted and crime did not go up.

So what does that tell us? It tells us that all those stops were essentially useless. and they were not what made crime go up or down. It just didn't have the impact it was supposed to have except to alienate a lot of New Yorkers and a lot of communities who didn't trust police and wouldn't cooperate with police and they need police. We know that crime didn't go up.

We know that the number of stops plummeted after the ruling. Racial disparities, however, persists. Even today, we know that the number of people stopped are overwhelmingly black and Latino, even today. So what does that tell you about the state of policing and about, you know, the aftermath following this ruling specifically? Right. I understand your question, and it's a very important one. I issued two opinions. And those two opinions, one was called the liability opinion. And one was called the remedial opinion. The liability opinion found that the city was liable for this unconstitutional practice and it had to stop. Meaning, you can still make stops, but you have to. have a reasonable suspicion to stop somebody. That's what the law is. The remedial opinion set up a monitorship and a monitor was appointed and a monitor worked for years with the police department

to institute reforms that I set forth in the remedial opinion. So there was far more training. They also had to document the stop in a better way, write up the reason. They had to tell the person stopped. Here's why you were stopped. Here's a form. Here's the name of the stopping officer. Oh, and the biggest one, of course, forgive me, was body cameras. That was the first really used by a big urban center of body cameras, which we accept today all over the United States. But all that said, I don't know that it was as effective as I would like. It was slow. It's taken years. The monitorship is still in effect. The current monitor wrote a report to the court. saying she was in trouble. She felt that not enough progress has been made. She's still getting

some resistance from the police department and the changes that need to be made. They're still disproportionate stopping of black and Hispanic people and the rise. Now we're seeing a rise and stops again and it's racially disproportionate. That's former Judge Shira Shinlin talking with WNYC's Tiffany Hanson. WNYC's Community Partnerships Desk is teaming up with the nonprofit street lab, to highlight stories from neighborhoods across New York City. Here's what we heard from folks in Washington Heights. I'm Charles O'Sull from Washington Heights. People tend to think of Washington Heights and think of the negative, like, violence.

But for us, it's a very warm community. I'm the founder of City Gymbois, a fitness company that mentors inner-city youth on the lifelong benefits of fitness and exercise. It's interesting because there's so many out-of-shave young people these days. kids, they don't know how to move anymore because there's no reason to move. We have Uber AIDS. Everything is, you know, I'll just bring it right to you. I'm a child.

I grew up in Washington Heights. I went to school here from immigrating parents from the Dominican Republic. Growing up in the Heights, it was always either you was a drug dealer or played basketball. There wasn't a lot of things you could look forward to. But as I met Charles and the city gym boys, I found that there was other things I was able to look for a passion for, which is fitness. Been with Charles for the last three years, he's been mentoring me. almost 21 already, and I could say I learned a lot through this organization. The biggest challenge I see is the fast food restaurants. You see Wendy's, you see McDonald's,

Burger King, Popeyes. It's in every corner now. The resources is also a big challenge. If you go to the store, a lot of the things that are healthy, they cost a lot of money. That's a big problem in this community. A lot of people don't have the income to even stay in a healthy life. They rather just go to McDonald's, get them a chicken, $1.53. If they want to go build a salary or get some vegetables, it will cost them a lot. My name is David Vines. I'm an immigration lawyer. So I work with an unaccompanied minors at a non-profit. And so I'm very fortunate that a fair amount of the work is remote. So I get to, during my lunch break, take a nice little walk with the pup. It's a beautiful neighborhood with like, you know,

a really wonderful combination of like families, young people, things to do, walkable, easy to get absolutely anywhere I need to go in the city over the subway. It's perfect. I really genuinely love it. My name is Veronica Santiago Liu. And I'm from WordUp Community Book Shop, which is down the here at 165 in Amsterdam Avenue. Word Up is a collectively run volunteer power, nonprofit, bookstore, and art space, community space. We sell, you know, used in new books in English and Spanish and often other languages, but we also host a lot of community events inside,

outside, online, you know, a space that's casual where you don't necessarily have the pressure to buy something, but you can gather over books or have this reflective space. I've lived here for more than 20 years. they're real things you need in neighborhoods. I find some neighborhoods in New York. You can't find a hardware store anymore. But, you know, right on the corner of where word up is,

we have within a block, every kind of school, every grade level, we have the post office. We have the hospital. We have a jail. We have everything right there. And that feels to me like a real space where real people live. My name is David Cahigas. I'm a mailman for this area here in Washington Heights.

Zip code, 132. I'm very friendly. I'm a person that always smiles, greet people, good morning, afternoon. So every day's a different day. You know, sometimes you find people in need. You stop. You give them a word.

Maybe that makes their day. And, you know, you keep on going. Maybe you help someone cross the street and elderly and stuff like that, you know, part of the daily day. My name is Haley Baez and I'm from Daigwin. My story is my mom surviving response. She's just always been there. She's always been like a role model in my life.

Like she's been through so much since she was very young because my grandma is an immigrant and they were very poor growing up. So, you know, seeing her, like go to something like that I really like destroyed me, but it made us stronger. Like our bond stronger. If you ever get mad at your parents, just remember that the day that they leave,

you will miss them more than anything. because when I saw my mom, so skinny, no hair, I regretted every time I was mad at her, every time I yelled at her. So just be thankful that you still have your parents around because I'm thankful I still have mine. That's a collection of voices from Washington Heights. Thanks for listening to NYC now from WNYC.

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