Watch out if you take a shortcut through a park that just closed for the night or if you put your backpack on the seat next to you in the subway because you might just get arrested - especially if you're black or Hispanic, reports the Gothamist
According to the website, the NYPD has made 97,487 misdemeanor arrests under the de Blasio Administration, slightly more than the first five months of Mayor Bloomberg's final year in office. Of these arrests, 86% have been of people that are either black or Hispanic, as compared to 86% of the people arrested for misdemeanor crimes under Bloomberg from January through May of 2013.
The startling statistics are part of a Police Reform Organizing Project report entitled, "Broken Windows Policing: A True Tale of Two Cities."
The report also includes examples of particularly egregious examples of aggressive policing of minor, and in some cases nonexistent offenses. Among these include:
- A police officer collaring a young man for having his backpack on the seat next to him.
- An cop issuing a summons to a woman woman for walking through a well-lit park in Brownsville, Brooklyn on her way to the subway just a few minutes after its 9 pm closing time.
- Police officers nabbing a Chinese woman with a license to sell flowers because she had two artificial flowers on her cart for decorative purposes.
