The New York Times has released some startling new statistics.

African Americans and Latinos were nine times more likely to be stopped and frisked in New York City than Caucasians in 2009. Police stopped 209,000 Black and Latinos in 2009 while they only stopped 53,000 Caucasians. In Ohio v. Terry the Supreme Court found it permissible to stop an individual if a police office has a reasonable suspicion that the person was involved in a crime. Furthermore the Supreme Court ruled that the officer could frisk the person if the officer has a reasonable suspicion that the person might be carrying a weapon. But in the New York City searches, less than two tenths of a per cent of the frisks yielded guns. Furthermore force was only used in 19 per cent of the stops of Caucasians while it was used in 25 per cent of the stops of African Americans and 27 per cent of the stops of Latinos.

But once the stop occurred arrest rates were similar. Slightly over six per cent of the Caucasians who were stopped were arrested and slightly less than six per cent of African American who were stopped were arrested. The primary reason given for stopping individuals were furtive movement which is so vague that anyone can be stopped for making a ‘furtive movement.” Only fifteen percent of those stopped are alleged to look like a person wanted for committing a crime.