Advocates who challenged the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk policing have requested a federal judge appoint an independent monitor to review the department’s enforcement of social distancing amid the coronavirus outbreak, according to new court filings.
The attorneys filed a motion in Manhattan federal court asking that Peter Zimroth — the court-appointed monitor assigned to review stop-and-frisk — be tasked with investigating the NYPD’s social distancing enforcement.
They also requested a moratorium be placed on the enforcement until Zimroth’s investigation ends.
In the filing, the attorneys noted that 81 percent of summonses handed out by NYPD cops for violating social distancing went to black and Latino New Yorkers.
They also highlighted a number of videos and media reports that showed scuffles between New Yorkers and cops who were enforcing social distancing guidelines.
“According to media coverage, one of these people was a Black man in Brownsville,” the court papers state.
“A video of his arrest went viral, showing him walking slowly up the street when the police ran up on him, grabbed him by the throat, tackled him to the ground, and handcuffed him,” it adds.
The filing also notes an apparent disproportionate response in precincts that are majority black and Latino.
Less than half of 311 calls about social distancing violations were made in precincts with majority-black and Latino populations, but more than 78 percent of summonses and arrests for violations occurred in those precincts, according to a tally by the Legal Aid Society.
A 64-year-old woman who was left in a vegetative state…
Source: NYPost
