Readers Sound Off on Police Discrimination, NYCHA and Night Owls

The April 12 editorial “What mass incarceration?” hails a steep decline in the number of criminal court cases in the five boroughs and a significant drop in the combined annual number of arrests, summonses and stop, question and frisk incidents. But you ignore the stark racial disparities that continue to exist in police actions despite the dramatic reductions in overall numbers.

It’s true that since 2011, after a tremendous advocacy effort, the city put in place numerous reforms regarding stop-and-frisk policy and broken-windows policing. Yet, in 2017, New Yorkers were stopped by the police 10,861 times, and still 90% of the people stopped were black or Latino. Moreover, 67%, or 7,301 people of the total stopped, were innocent of any wrongdoing. Current policies have reduced the total number of people impacted — but not the disproportionality at which communities of color are impacted.

If we refuse to acknowledge the racial injustice at the core of how we apply our laws, then we will continue to see this targeted effort to single out and destroy communities of color. 

Khalil A. Cumberbatch
Associate Vice President of Policy , The Fortune Society