Pros And Cons Of Stop And Frisk

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“Stop and Frisk,” a policy which initial intention was to decrease crime rates, became a system of subliminal racial profiling for police officers that more often than not result in intrusive, momentary detentions that ingrained fear in people of color. Biased opinions and spontaneous detentions intensified the insecurity a man of color undergoes when walking the street; afraid that at any moment, he will be stopped by a police officer who would have solely based his or her suspicions on physical appearance. Stop and Frisk policy should not be reinstated because this policy perpetuates the use of profiling and bias to determine whether a person is dangerous to society; a person should not be prone to momentary interview detentions that are…show more content…
According to Stop and Frisk- Stop & Brownsville, “encounters can be brisk and intrusive.” Albeit police officers are limited to questioning unless there is reason to believe a person is culpable of a felony, questioning in itself is intrusive to those who have done no wrong and are profiled entirely on the basis of their race. The policy indicates that a police officer may ask for information regarding their identity and where they live; these protocols may serve as another form of oppression given that a person is very often judged by the neighborhood in which their reside. In addition, it is not only the preoccupation of possible injustices being committed but rather the tragedies in cases of police brutality that have already occurred; innocent people of color being murdered on the basis of suspicion is enough reason to obliterate “Stop and Frisk”. The law code itself states the following: “A police officer or court officer, as the case may be, reasonably suspects that he is in danger of physical injury, he may reach such person for a deadly weapon or any instrument, article or substance readily capable of causing serious physical injury.” Although there is a perception that a police officer should be able to utilize his or her weapon when they feel their life is threatened, our country has time after time, been witness of black men being killed at the hands of police officers when they posed no threat and the officer behaved spontaneously. Thus, this proves that suspicion at mere glance is not reliable enough to determine who should be stopped and
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