In Their Own Words
Part 4: Fit The Description
“The Biggest Gang Here in New York City”: From Serve and Protect to Patrol and Control
Note: PROP originally published this report in May 2013. It is available in .pdf format from the PROP website. PROP is republishing it here in multiple parts to make its content more widely available and in the hope of spreading its findings and message. This report is even more relevant in light of continued public protests and discourse on biased policing practices in NYC and the United States.
“When you’re young and Black, no matter how you look you fit the description.” Tyquan Brehon, who was stopped more than 60 times before age 18.51
“I got a ticket for coming out of my building, for nothing… and then they started searching me, talking about ‘I fit the description.’” Marcus.52
“These guys are rude. They throw you up against the wall. They don’t give you no explanation. ‘You fit the description.’ It’s the same thing every time.” New Yorker.53
“I asked them why I was being pulled over and they just told me I was being pulled over because I fit a description.” Rudens.54
“I wish this was an isolated incident, but it’s not. Not for countless others and not even for myself. I ‘fit the description’ of what stop and frisk policies are targeting. Black. Male. Young. I am a prime candidate to be stopped and searched. So much so, that I never leave my house without identification.” Christian Lassiter, staff attorney with Bronx Defenders.55
“I had several incidents of a few of my [seventh-grade] students being stopped and frisked. What the police would tell them, in their defense, was that they fit the description of a criminal in the area. But it seemed to be very recurring.” Alba Lamar, teacher, describing repeated instances of stop-and-frisk of her 7th-grade students in the South Bronx.56
“We had just came out the house and we was walking towards the store, which is down the block. And [the cops] didn’t ask for no I.D., they just said search yourself. Put your hands up, so they could search him. They searched him, and I was asking, ‘What is it for?’ And they said someone just got robbed around the corner and he fit the description. Just like that.” Brownsville woman.57
“What is it about me that makes me so suspicious, and gives police officers hunches to search me? Honestly, I think it’s because of the way I look.” Emanuel Candelario, Bronx youth worker, who has been stopped ten times by the NYPD.58
“Now, I’m not a thug, I’m not a hoodlum. You know, I’m well educated. But I’m still a black man… and I can get stopped, day or night, it doesn’t matter.” Bronx resident.59
“That’s when I first understood that cops are employed to help everyone except black men.” Moses Merisier.60
“I was walking, and a cop said, ‘Where’s the weed?’ In my mind, I’m like, ‘Yo, this guy’s a racist.’ ” Michael Delgado, 18, on stop-and-frisk incident in East New York, Brooklyn.61
“This practice of stopping, frisking and intimidating kids really angers me. I am a kid who follows the rules, goes to school every day, and spends my free time trying to make my community a better place. But none of that matters because I am young and Latino.” Justin Rosado, 17, Brooklyn resident and member of Make the Road New York.62
“[Cops] harass the Hispanic transgender community in Queens, because they know that most of them, 60 % of the community, are mostly immigrants… And some of them, they came illegally; they don’t have a legal status. So it’s an easy target to go after them. They just go for Hispanic, transgender women, because they know they don’t speak English. They don’t have education. They don’t know the law in the United States.” April R. 63
“I have a mentally retarded son that the police have stopped in my neighborhood, and frisked him, and almost took him into the police car for something that they thought he was doing… I felt like he was a target after a while.” Muneebah, Bronx mother.64
“I feel like the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk policy is based solely upon the impression that all children around my age that dress the way I do, or are my color — unfortunately, or have tattoos, are automatically up to something bad, or automatically trying to hurt other people, automatically the villain.” Cory Smith, 16-year-old.65
“I’ve been a victim of these racist ‘stop and frisk’ tactics since before there was a name for it. Now it breaks my heart to know that I’m going to have to sit my son down and tell him that, like myself, chances are he will be searched, groped, stripped, and maybe even beaten by the cops, just because he’s Latino.” Steve Kohut, Justice Committee organizer.66
“I’m in college, I go to school, I’m a good person, but when [the cops] look at me, they don’t see that.” Prince.67
“If you’re a Black male and you’re not walking around with a suit and tie on, you’re always suspected of committing a crime.” Brent C., Brooklyn resident.68
“Sometimes I’m targeted as a drug dealer, sometimes as someone interfering with the quality of life, sometimes as a gay African-American man in a place I don’t belong.” Chris Bilal, who has been stopped three times by the NYPD.69
“[Police] need to see citizens as human beings and not just as quotas and [not see] young men as threats, young Black and Latino men, but as people.” Emanuel Candelario, Bronx youth worker.70
You can read this report in full, and many others, on PROP’s website.
