CPR Responds to Release of Report by Facilitator of Stop-and-Frisk Court-Ordered Reform Process

In response to the filing of a final report by the Facilitator of the court-ordered reform process to stop-and-frisk to the court, Communities United for Police Reform (CPR) released the following statement from spokesperson Linda Tigani of Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, whose member was the lead plaintiff in Floyd v. New York. CPR was a named stakeholder in the Court’s ruling in Floyd v. New York, Ligon v. New York and Davis v. New York, and coordinated the involvement of directly-affected community members in the court-ordered reform process.

“The decrease in the overall number of stop-and-frisks being reported by the NYPD is inaccurate and presents a false picture of reality on the ground in communities. The abusive, discriminatory use of stop-and-frisk continues, with at least thousands of stops improperly going unreported and thousands more police interactions, practically perceived as stops by civilians, not being accounted for in the NYPD's data. Racial disparities in who is stopped continue – overwhelmingly of Black and Latinx New Yorkers – with the majority of stops still resulting in neither arrest nor summons, constituting unnecessary police intrusions into people's daily lives. Yet despite these facts, the NYPD has failed to accept the most essential reforms that communities are demanding through the court-ordered reform process to resolve the long-standing problems with stop-and-frisk. Judge Scheindlin articulated that ‘communities most affected by the NYPD’s use of stop and frisk have a distinct perspective that is highly relevant to crafting effective reforms’ and community members have highlighted reforms that must be implemented for this court reform process to be successful and not simply a mirage. The court should require the NYPD to implement these reforms being demanded by community members most impacted by stop-and-frisk as part of the reform process:

1. Zero Tolerance for Abusive Policing & Transparent Discipline: There must be a system of meaningful, timely and transparent discipline and accountability for officers and precincts/commands for unconstitutional and abusive stops.  There must be a publicly available summary of related misconduct and the range of discipline that officers will face for such misconduct, and precincts will face for allowing officers who repeatedly engage in unconstitutional or abusive stops.
    
2. Transparency for All Stops: The NYPD must be required to record and publicly report (quarterly and annually) all level 2 and level 1 encounters, disaggregated by demographic, geographic, and precinct/command information. New York State has convoluted case law related to pedestrian stops that legally permits the NYPD to omit police encounters that civilians experience as stops. The NYPD should be required to report them, rather than conceal the thousands of investigatory encounters that New Yorkers are experiencing just like stops. 
   
   Since these lower level investigatory encounters, under law, provide the person with the right to walk away from the encounter, officers should be required to notify people of their freedom to leave encounters that are not level 3 reasonable suspicion stops. It is the only way to ensure that officers are not abusing their authority by giving the impression that the person cannot leave and then misreporting by not recording it as a stop.
   
   Officers should be required to identify themselves, explain the reason for the encounter, and provide their pre-typed business card in all level 1 encounters, just as they are required to in other encounters.
    
3. Independent Community Board to Assess Compliance: Require the creation and resourcing of an independent community board, consisting of at least 5-7 organizations that are led by, serve, and organize directly-impacted communities and police accountability groups with a significant history of work with the Floyd/Daniels/Ligon cases. An independent and resourced community board is required to ensure that there is a community-led assessment of NYPD compliance that is based on the realities experienced by people most impacted by stop-and-frisk.” 

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About Communities United for Police Reform

Communities United for Police Reform (CPR) is an unprecedented campaign to end discriminatory policing practices in New York, and to build a lasting movement that promotes public safety and policing practices based on cooperation and respect– not discriminatory targeting and harassment.

CPR brings together a movement of community members, lawyers, researchers and activists to work for change. The partners in this campaign come from all 5 boroughs, from all walks of life and represent many of those unfairly targeted the most by the NYPD. CPR is fighting for reforms that will promote community safety while ensuring that the NYPD protects and serves all New Yorkers.

Learn more: http://changethenypd.org/
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