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Reality Busts Through the Door of The New York Post
Despite Editorial Page's Stance in Favor of Racially Biased Stop-and-Frisk Tactics, the Humiliation of One of their Reporters at the Hands of the NYPD is Too Much to Ignore In a gripping first-person account, New York Post reporter Leonardo Blair, an African-American Columbia University journalism school graduate, told of his groundless stop-and-frisk account at the hands of two NYPD officers:
Despite Editorial Page’s Stance in Favor of Racially Biased Stop-and-Frisk Tactics, the Humiliation of One of their Reporters at the Hands of the NYPD is Too Much to Ignore
In a gripping first-person account, New York Post reporter Leonardo Blair, an African-American Columbia University journalism school graduate, told of his groundless stop-and-frisk account at the hands of two NYPD officers:
I was just trying to get home.
It was 8:20 p.m. Wednesday, and I had just finished parking my 1993 Toyota Camry along Arnow Avenue in the Allerton section of The Bronx, where I have been living with my family since graduating from Columbia University last May.
Less than a block from my door, I heard a car’s squeaking brakes. I would have ignored the sound if I hadn’t seen an NYPD squad car out of the corner of my eye. I was relieved for a moment – until I saw the officers’ faces.
Click here to read the full account.
Though Mr. Blair’s story is gripping, it is sadly far from unique.
Between January 2006 and September 2007, NYPD officers stopped and frisked 867,617 New Yorkers — a startling rate of 1,360 every day. Almost 90 percent of those stopped were innocent.
The racial disparities are stark: Police stopped 453,042 blacks and only 94,530 whites during that period.
Mr. Blair’s experience shows just how misguided The Post’s own editorial stance has been.
Click here to read The Post’s most recent editorial on the subject, a gross misrepresentation of facts and an affront to common sense.
The next time The Post’s editorial writers seek to dismiss valid complaints against the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk tactics as “race-baiting,” perhaps they should walk across the newsroom and have a conversation with Leonardo Blair.