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New Legal Agreement Marks the Beginning of the End of NYC's Stop-and-Frisk Policies

Photo: washingtonpost.com Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Thursday that civil rights lawyers have settled a long-standing legal battle over the New York City Police Department's practice of stop-question-and-frisk, reported The New York Times .
Photo: washingtonpost.com
Photo: washingtonpost.com

Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Thursday that civil rights lawyers have settled a long-standing legal battle over the New York City Police Department's practice of stop-question-and-frisk, reported The New York Times.

If you recall, Judge Shira Scheindlin in August had ordered widespread reforms of the department's "policies, training, supervision, monitoring and discipline regarding stop-and-frisk." But former mayor Michael Bloomberg appealed the judge's ruling.

Well, de Blasio essentially is moving to reverse the course set by Bloomberg.

"We're here today to turn the page on one of the most divisive problems in our city," de Blasio said at a news conference. "We believe in ending the overuse of stop-and-frisk that has unfairly targeted young African-American and Latino men."

At the height of the program, in the first quarter of 2012, the police stopped mostly black and Latino men on more than 200,000 occasions. A vast majority of those stopped were found to have done nothing wrong.

The mayor's move to end stop-and-frisk is a part of a campaign pledge that had helped propel him to his landslide victory.

A new judge, Analisa Torres, will be asked to approve the agreement; once it is ratified, de Blasio said, "we will drop the appeal, and also with the court's approval, we will settle the case."

The process of developing reforms would then begin.




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