skip to main |
skip to sidebar
From
The Gothamist in NYC:
A legally blind black man became the first person to sue the city for
unlawful use of stop-and-frisk—based on an ordeal that took place in
Harlem in September 2010—following the ruling that deems the practice
unconstitutional.
54-year-old Jamaica resident Allen Moye (pictured) filed a lawsuit yesterday for
an arrest he claims was predicated on bogus charges, the result of a
stop made as he waited for a friend on the corner of W.118th Street late
one afternoon three years ago. According to the Daily News, the officers reportedly snatched Moye's ID, and left him handcuffed in a police van for several hours.
“They treated me like I was from another planet, like I just landed
in a space ship,” he told the tabloid. “They said they didn’t care about
the Fourth Amendment.
The lawsuit directly links Moye's treatment with the August 12 ruling by Judge Shira Scheindlin,
which opines that "the City acted with deliberate indifference toward
the NYPD’s practice of making unconstitutional stops and conducting
unconstitutional frisks."
The city's law department says that it's still awaiting the formal
papers, and will "review the case thoroughly." However, a city legal
source clarifies that the ruling involved requested policy changes, but
that Moye is seeking damages, meaning he'll have to prove in a court of
law that he was unconstitutionally stopped and falsely arrested.
The charges against Moye—which were related to credit card forgery—were dropped in February 2011.
