The Persistent Problem of Stop and Frisk

Good morning. It’s Tuesday. Today we’ll look at a new report on the Police Department’s use of unlawful stop-and-frisk tactics. We’ll also learn about a newly sustainable N.Y.U. dorm.

New York City has been trying to curb the practice of unlawful stops, frisks and searches by police officers for more than a decade. But such tactics were still being used in 2023, according to a new report from a court-appointed monitor that is based on the most recent available data.

On Monday, the monitor, Mylan Denerstein, filed a report in federal court in Manhattan that determined that the Police Department’s Neighborhood Safety Teams and Public Safety Teams had made unlawful stops at least a quarter of the time in 2023 and that command-level supervisors had regularly failed to address them.

As my colleague Maia Coleman reports, the monitor called for accountability for these anti-crime units, which have a troubled history.

“The ball is in the Department’s hands, and the N.Y.P.D. can do this,” Denerstein wrote. “The law requires no less.”

A federal court appointed a monitor in 2013 to oversee the department’s use of stop and frisk after ruling that such tactics were unconstitutional. The latest report is the 23rd since then.

Denerstein’s team found that the rate of unlawful stops, frisks and searches had not improved and in some respects had worsened since its most recent audit in June 2023. Officers on these teams had a legal basis for making stops 75 percent of the time, the report found. And 89 percent of the people stopped were Black or Hispanic men, according to the report.

The Neighborhood Safety Teams were dissolved in 2020 under Mayor Bill de Blasio, but his successor, Mayor Eric Adams, resurrected them in 2022 even though they had a disproportionate number of shootings and a history of racially profiling Black and Latino men.

These squads don’t look like typical patrol officers. They wear different uniforms, drive unmarked cars and are generally not expected to respond to emergency calls, the report said.

Stop-and-frisk abuses were higher among the anti-crime units, the report said, partly because those officers were overwhelmingly initiating stops rather than responding to radio calls or witness complaints.

A lack of oversight by commanders and supervisors added to the problem, the monitor said. The audit deemed 22 percent of stops by anti-crime units and patrol officers to be unlawful, but supervisors found that just 1 percent were. In several instances, supervisors failed to review searches recorded on body cameras or reported that a frisk had been conducted legally when no frisk had happened at all.

Denerstein acknowledged in the report that the Police Department had made improvements since January 2024, when it rolled out a plan to improve vetting and training for Neighborhood Safety Teams, and she said that her team had met regularly with chiefs to review footage from body-worn cameras.

The report set a deadline for all officers: They must be at least 85 percent compliant with constitutional standards for stops, frisks and searches by the end of September. Failure to do so could result in the monitor’s recommending “further action” to the court.

“They have all the tools,” Denerstein said. “What they lack is accountability, and I think that rests with supervisors in the field all the way up through the command.”

Weather

Expect mostly sunny skies with a high near 45 degrees. In the evening, clouds will return with a low around 27 degrees.

ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKING

In effect until Feb. 12 (Lincoln’s Birthday).

The latest New York news

The dorm is one of very few structures among the billions of square feet of buildings in the city that meet sustainability and passive house standards, prioritizing energy efficiency and comfortable indoor temperatures.

Understanding the building and its history was key. The architectural firm working on the project made sure to “peel back” only as much as was needed, which helped reduce time and costs and prevented any over-construction.

Cecil Scheib, N.Y.U.’s chief sustainability officer, said the renovation would help the university move “toward our climate neutral goal by 2040.”

“If we’re going to have clean air, if we’re going fight climate change, if we’re going to be comfortable and healthy, I want to see other people doing this, too,” he said.

Dear Diary:

I was on the southbound 6 train in the Bronx. A well-dressed man sitting across from me was drawing with a pencil in a large, spiral-bound sketchbook.

A young boy carrying a box of candy approached him, hoping for a sale or donation. After looking at his drawing, the boy said something to him.

The man handed the sketchbook to the boy, who set his box of candy in the man’s lap and began to draw, leaning the sketchbook against the subway car door.

By the time we reached the next stop, the boy had drawn a figure with one raised arm that was holding a round object.