Protestors marched through Harlem this past Father's Day dissenting Stop and Frisk. Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

by Adel Manoukian

The NYPD’s Stop and Frisk Policy has been under much public scrutiny for some time due to the police’s tendency to detain and sometimes search black and Latino young men.

Of the close to 700,000 people stopped last year, more than 80% were Hispanic and black. Close to half were frisked and 10 percent were arrested.

Like the practice, it seems New York City voters are divided along racial lines over the policy. A poll by Quinnipiac University released today reveals that 69% of black voters disapprove of Stop and Frisk while 53% of Hispanic voters and 57% of white voters approve of the policy. The over-the-phone survey of 1,298 city residents also found that men are divided on the practice with 47% in favor. Women, however, oppose the practice 51-43 percent. Overall, 50% of voters disapprove while 45% approve of Stop and Frisk.

While critics of the policy argue racism and that police unfairly target minorities, Mayor Bloomberg feels he has created a safer city with the practice in tact because it can persuade criminals to leave their guns at home. Last year, the police only confiscated 780 guns out of 684,330 stops made. That’s a rate of 1.1 guns every 1,000 stops, according to NY Times reports.

50% of voters believe that a decrease in police use of the policy would not lead to an increase in gun violence, considering it may not even be affective. Again, the vote is very divided among race–63% of black voters agree, while 49% of white voters and 52% of Hispanic voters believe that a decreased use of the policy would lead to an increase in gun violence.

“Public opinion is just about down-the-middle on the police tactic of stop and frisk,” said Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. “If the decline in such stops persists, will gun violence grow? On this question, too, New Yorkers are divided. But we’re still a liberal city. If there’s a choice between taking all steps to end crime and protecting civil liberties, New Yorkers come down 78 – 16 percent on the civil liberties side. “

Mayor Michael Bloomberg

In a press conference yesterday morning at the First Baptist Church of Brownsville, Brooklyn, Mayor Bloomberg stood by the controversial Stop-and-Frisk policy that the NYPD so readily uses.

Although Bloomberg agrees that people who are stopped and frisked by police deserve more respect and better treatment, the mayor stands by the argument that the policy has created a safer city and he refuses to put an end to it. The policy, enacted in the mid-90s, gives police the authority to stop a person and search them, in case of any weapons. In 2011 alone, about 684,330 people were stopped, questioned and/or searched. About 780 guns were actually seized by police. 87% of those who were searched were young male Latinos and blacks, leading many to believe the searched go under racial profiling.

Bloomberg denies this idea.

“If we stopped people based on census numbers, we would stop many fewer criminals, recover many fewer weapons and allow many more violent crimes to take place,” Mr. Bloomberg said at the press conference according to reports from the NY Times.

The conference comes after a spur of state and city elected officials and organizations traveled to Washington, D.C., to meet with U.S. Department of Justice officials about the issue of possible discrimination that goes along with the policy.

In his speech, Bloomberg claims that police use the policy more in East New York and Brownsville because of the higher crime rates compared to other parts of the city not because of race.

Bloomberg also understands new methods of conducting a search should be taken into consideration to improve the situation.