Preview

Stop And Frisk Research Paper

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1137 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Stop And Frisk Research Paper
Is New York City’s Stop and Frisk law infringing upon Americans rights? In 2011, 685, 724 people were stopped and frisked by the police. This is a record high by more than 50,000 stops in New York City, 87% of the stops were either black or Latino, raising the question of is this morally ethical due to racial profiling (NYCLU, 2014). Why should an individual be stopped and frisked without probable cause? Stopping and frisking without probable cause is an act of racism, profiling someone due to their skin color is wrong, unethical, and creates an outlook that only, or mostly speaking people of color are our criminals of society. Black and Latino are not the sole criminals commiting just as many violent acts or same severity of crimes more than other people of society, so why should people of color be a higher concern than some not of color? If the laws of New York City say that any individual can be stopped and frisked, every person should be searched equally, instead of predominantly people of color. After all, every person of every race commits the same crime, and must be seen as an equal threat to society. For example, in The East Side of New York, police are heavily profiling. 50% of the population consists of blacks, and 39% percent being Hispanic. Only 8% of the residents over the age of 25 have a college degree (NYC, 2014). This has been a notorious area for police officers to stop and frisk. This is a prime example of a …show more content…
"We are eager to finally begin creating real change"(Fox News, 2014). It is important to note people with high political power such as Vincent Warren are advocating of change of the stop and frisk laws, making this topic of the morals behind the stop and frisk laws are wrong, and reform is necessary to protect The Constitutional rights of the people of

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Racial profiling is supposed to be illegal but there are many cases that show that it is still happening in the United States. We have seen a lot of racial profiling since the events of 9/11 but African Americans have been racially profiled way before that event happened. I personally have been a victim of racial profiling and was pulled over for no apparent reason other than the fact that I was African American. Although I agree that the nation’s security is very important I don’t agree on signaling certain people out just because of their race. This is something that Whites would rarely if ever have to deal…

    • 733 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    My friend Tony is an American citizen of seventeen, born and raised in the United States but he is of African American descent. Once when his mother needed eggs, she sent him to the grocery store. On the way, he was pulled over by a police officer and questioned, after fifteen minutes the police officer let him go. Was he speeding? Driving recklessly? No, there was nothing wrong with his driving. The only reason he was pulled over and questioned was because he was African American. The whole situation was humiliating and debasing for Tony. This ordeal and others like it happen against citizens because of something they cannot even help, the color of their skin. Someone who shares the same opinion on this matter is Bob Herbert. In “Hounding the Innocent”, Herbert stated, “Ethnic profiling by law-enforcement authorities in the United States comes in many forms, and all of them are disgusting.” Self-respect, worth and dignity will certainly suffer a loss as a result of this practice.…

    • 643 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the United States of America racial discrimination still exists to this day. Minorities in our country are not seen as equal people. When a person is deprived of their human rights it makes them feel degraded and troubled. In order to become a more civilized country, we must forget the color of our own skin and live with each other as one. In the article “Why Racial Profiling is a Bad Idea” by Tom Head, discusses the way cops pay more attention to those of minority races and how they usually find them guilty of crimes they didn’t commit. Even though many officers will deny their participation in this type of profiling, a lot use this tactic to pull over and arrest Minority races. The article “Racial Profiling Lives On” by Devon Carbado, Cheryl Harris and Kimberle Crenshaw, also displays examples of how racial profiling continues to this day. There are many ways cops can search/arrest African Americans or other Minorities for no reason and still keep from breaking the Fourth Amendment and the authors of “Racial Profiling Lives On” supports there claims with emotional examples that appeal to a pathological type of audience.…

    • 1254 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Essay On Stop And Frisk

    • 771 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The Founding Fathers believed that the sanctity of individual rights must be held above all else, due to their prior experiences with the tyrannical rule of King George III of Great Britain. After the drafting and ratification of the Constitution, the United States government has introduced several laws and allowed several actions that compromise the liberties guaranteed by the Constitution in the supposed name of security or the general welfare. These laws include the Espionage Act which was introduced during World War I, and the use and allowance of ‘Stop and Frisk’ procedures amongst America’s various police agencies. The introduction and use of these laws and procedures were meant to keep the American public safe following outbreaks of war and to try and prevent weapon related violence, but they also compromise the liberties that are ensured to the…

    • 771 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In an effort to maximize an individuals rights during search and seizures along with stop-and-frisks, the United States government has developed numerous laws and amendments. The Fourth Amendment states, The right of people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched , and the persons or things to be seized (U.S. Constitution). This amendment was first used in the court system in the case of Terry vs. Ohio (1968). This case was the case that shaped the stop-and-frisk laws that are found in our country today. In 1942 legislators started to authorize stops-and-frisks on less than probable cause under the Uniform Arrest Act. This act gave an officer the right stop a person in public based upon reasonable ground to suspect that the person is committing has committed, or is about to commit a crime, and then search him for a dangerous weapon if the officer has reasonable ground to believe that he is in danger (Whitebread, 2000). In 1968 the Supreme Court addressed the issue in terry v. ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S. Ct. 1868, 20 L. Ed. 2d 889. In Terry an experienced plainclothes officer observed three men acting suspiciously; they were walking back and forth on a street and peering into a particular store window. The officer concluded that the men were preparing to rob a nearby store and approached them. He identified himself as a police officer and asked for their names. Unsatisfied with their responses, he then subjected one of the men to a frisk, which produced a gun for which the suspect…

    • 372 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Stop Frisk

    • 1682 Words
    • 4 Pages

    In the city where crime was at all time high during the nineties, the top politicians in New York City decided that something should be done to help stop crime. The NYPD implemented the “Stop and Frisk” policy to bring the crime rate down in the city. However it did more than exceed its expectations and it has been more of a negative than a positive. This policy created tension between the NYPD and the law abiding citizens of New York City because thousands stopped were people of the Black and Latino communities. According to the US Census Bureau NYC has a population of 8,336,697 people. Blacks and Latinos make up 53% of the city population. 85% of New Yorkers stopped are Black and Latino men and 6% of that number actually led to an arrest (NYCLU). At this shocking percentage, it’s apparent that this policy is discriminatory against Blacks and Latinos. Not only is this policy discriminatory, it has violated citizens constitutional rights and been deemed racial profiling.…

    • 1682 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    stop and frisk

    • 756 Words
    • 4 Pages

    In America there have been multiple tyrannical actions that the government have used on citizens and innocent bystanders. One of these actions are called “Stop and Frisk” which is a prevalent tactic used, especially in New York. “Stop and Frisk” means to be randomly searched by police or high authority when they suspect a bystander is carrying something suspicious. “Stop and Frisk” is a political issue that has been a concern for a long period of time. According to the articles “Growing up with Stop and Frisk” by Sara Maria Glanowski and “Why Stop and Frisk Matters, Even if You Don’t Live in New York” by Andrew Cohen, the cons towards “Stop and Frisk” is clearly stated and relevant. People are being stopped based off racial profiling, while statistics proves that majority of the time, they are innocent. Stop and Frisk must be impermissible and abolished because it is unconstitutional and individuals are stopped based off appearance and not on evidence that proves there guilty.…

    • 756 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    In the United States, ‘The land of the Free’, racial profiling of minority groups seems all too common. Many Americans believe that law enforcement as well as many other people often discriminates on minority groups simply because of their color of their skin. Civil rights activist and many leaders of minority groups are pressuring Enforcement agencies to eliminate racial and ethnic profiling during traffic stops and supposed random pedestrian stops. However, many law enforcement representatives claim that the complaints about these activities are overstated and are simply in the heads of the accusers. As a nation with a history of racial slavery and racial segregation, particularly towards any group that is not Anglo-American or fair skinned, African-Americans have long complained of racial profiling. Although racial slavery has been over for over one hundred years, and segregation that ended over fifty years ago, there is still tension between many people over race. Hispanics and Muslims are two other ethnic groups that feel the racial profiling, often being suspected of being terrorists or being illegal immigrants.…

    • 1618 Words
    • 47 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Our country was founded on this idea of freedom and how America was this land of opportunity. Time and history tells us it was easier said than done because racism restricted certain groups from achieving that “opportunity”. This social issue still haunts today but manifest not whips and chains but through racial profiling. Racial profiling is unjust, and a poison to the ideas of Democracy because it generalizes a specific group as being criminal and therefore makes the rest society inherit the same perception. In our society today, we have both Blacks and Latinos victimized depending on what neighborhood they are from and economical status. There are laws in place for the purpose of discouraging minorities to feel comfortable within their own skin. Two examples that will be further discussed are the SB 1070 and Stop and Frisk. Racial profiling can have a psychological effect to the targeted ethnicity. If the federal government does not intervene and seek to put an end to these unconstitutional laws, which discriminate against minorities, than we would be abolishing ones civil rights.…

    • 2081 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Although racial profiling is legal, it's is unacceptable and very common in society. Racial profiling is defined as, “discriminatory practice by law enforcement officials of targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual's race, ethnicity, religion or national origin.” Even though it is said that in America racism is not acceptable, it is practiced on today’s society making it seem acceptable to everyone. As said in the article “Jim Crow Policing” by Bob Herbert, “It is incredible how few of the stops yielded any law enforcement benefit. Contraband, which usually means drugs, was found only in 1.6 percent of the stops of black New Yorkers. For…

    • 1464 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Discrimination persists in our world today, racial profiling is a social justice issue that is still a major problem we face that can not be overlooked. The most common and unfair issues we face is unconcious profiling. An example is by the North Carolina Highway…

    • 637 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Racial profiling is destroying the U.S. because in every single one of the cases about this profiling no justice is served; none. After both of the unarmed men were shot or brutalized, Freddie Gray and Michael Brown, none of the police officers were convicted of murder. The six officers in the case of Freddie Gray were either acquitted or not guilty. The officer in the case of Michael Brown, Darren Wilson, was found not guilty. The continuous theme of officers killing unarmed black men and pleading not guilty is a process that needs to be stopped…

    • 618 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Now profiling has been extended to include people who are overweight, those of Muslim faith, and even people with disabilities. Overweight people are targeted by the transportation industry on a daily basis, people with disabilities are infringed upon in the workplace, and people with different faiths are targeted in almost every aspect of society in America. So racial profiling has grown to become a National Pandemic. Nadra Kareem Nittle, a writer for about.com, defines racial profiling as “a form of discrimination by which law enforcement uses a person’s race or cultural background as the primary reason to suspect that the individual has broken the law.” (http://racerelations.about.com/od/thelegalsystem/g/racialprofiling.htm), she goes on to talk about how people of Arab decent have become targets of profiling after the attacks of September 11th. But profiling alone is “the use characteristics to determine whether a person may engage in illegal…

    • 973 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Criminal Profiling

    • 565 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Racial profiling is used by police especially when it comes to stop and frisk. According to some studies, Race profiling allows the police to lower crime rates in cases were they are able to cease drugs and weapons from their searches, but it also subjects a lot of innocent people to interrogation. But other studies indicate that the crime rates were already declining before stop and risk were put in place. The 4th amendment allows the right of the people to be secure in their person and their property from unreasonable search and seizure without a warrant due to probable cause. So regardless of the minimal benefits of racial profiling, it is still illegal. I believe if all races are not subject to racial profiling then it should not be used in regular police procedure, because the systems needs to be fair for all citizens. Race can still be used as a factor of profiling, but it does not need to be the key factor. Race along side other contributing factors could remove the bias out of the…

    • 565 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    (Hook)”It’s an experience that even Oprah Winfrey, Condoleezza Rice, and President Obama have each said they experienced(Bruinius 1).Racial profiling is “commonly defined as a practice that targets people for suspicion of crime based on their race, ethnicity, religion or national origin(“Racial Profiling”). Racial profiling causes many deaths each year and creates a huge amount of tension between colored communities and their law enforcement. An example would be of Ferguson, Missouri in 2014 where Michael Brown, who was an 18 year old African American, was shot and killed by Darren Wilson, who was a 28 year old Ferguson police officer(“What happened in Ferguson”). There have been multiple riots since the incident in Ferguson and it shows that(Thesis) more needs to be done to…

    • 531 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays