Are Police Violating The 4th Amendment?

The government is always watching to ensure safety of their country, including everything and everyone in it. Camera surveillance has become an accepted and almost expected addition to modern safety and crime prevention (“Where” para 1). Many people willingly give authorization to companies like Google and Facebook to make billions selling their personal preferences, interests, and data. Canada participates with the United States and other countries in monitoring national and even global communications (“Where” para 2). Many question the usefulness of this kind of surveillance (Hier, Let, and Walby 1).However, surveillance, used non-discriminatorily, is, arguably, the key technology to preventing terrorist plots (Eijkman 1). Government

Fourth Amendment protects people from unreasonable searches and seizures of certain papers, books, documents etc. Rules are not violated in it. There must be probable reason because in order to arrest a particular person without a search warrant. It possesses an oath or affirmation from the government. It has two fundamental rights as Right to privacy and Right to freedom. Search occurs when it has a correct reason that was obligated by the government people. Private individuals are violated from this amendment. A seizure happens the owner must has a right documents with him on his own property, if not the documents is seized and the person gets arrested. Sometimes the property belongs to other possessor but in mistake reasonable person gets involved in the task. The banning of unreasonable searches can violate many things to be happen.

As crime rates rise, police must come up with new methods to counteract these increases. Many of these methods come with pros and cons that may affect the way the public views Police officers and law enforcement in general. Some of these methods may seem like a violation to people’s rights, even though they may be constitutional. One of these methods known as Stop and Frisk is one of the most widely debated topics in America when it comes to dealing with Police actions and Constitutional rights.

Racial profiling is simply, “the unlawful police practice of using race, color, or ethnic background, as the reason for conducting a traffic stop on an individual.” (Michigan Civil Rights Commission) This definition can be extended to any kind of discrimination mainly based on myths and stereotypes towards a certain race or ethnicity. However, the term racial profiling is commonly used when a police officer or any other law enforcer stops, questions, searches or arrests an individual purely on the basis of their race. African Americans or simply blacks have been the major racial group that has suffered much of racial profiling. Much of this is based on the stereotypes against the blacks are perceived as more likely to engage in criminal activities. For instance, in a 2013 Racial Profiling Data from Ferguson Police Department, out of 5384 police stops, 4632 were against blacks. (Ferguson Police Dept. 1) Despite the low population of blacks in U.S. compared to other races, the former continues being subjected to more racial profiling. Racial profiling against African Americans continues to expose the blacks to humiliation and racial injustices, as this paper will expose, thereby calling for the responsible authorities to address and find solutions for the problem.

Second, police in our country do racial profiling. This practice of law enforcement is morally wrong and personally sickening. Racial Profiling is the idea that just because someone is a different race automatically makes that one person a suspect. Racial Profiling goes against everything that the United States Constitution is about. The constitution is about freedom, equality, and the pursuit of happiness. Our law enforcement is put into place to serve and protect the innocent. The constitution protects us of unlawful search and seizers as well. Racial profiling makes our law enforcement give in their minds probable cause when there really is not any in the first place. Also, it goes against the United States Constitution. The American Civil Liberties Union and American Civil Liberites Union Foundation said, “Racial profiling is a longstanding and deeply troubling national problem despite claims that the United States has entered a “post-racial era.” It occurs every day, in cities and towns across the country, when law enforcement and private security target people of color for humiliating and often frightening detentions, interrogations, and searches without evidence of criminal activity and based on perceived race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion. Racial profiling is

The New York Police Department's stop and frisk has been around for several years and people recently have been taking action about it but this is a very important and useful practice that officer conduct on a daily base, police officer are doing the right thing especially if neighborhoods are known for criminal or violent activities then these people should be stopped, questioned and frisked, from January to June of 2013 the NYPD's report shows that African American and Hispanics are more active to commit crimes like robbery, rape, murder and manslaughter, felonious assault, grand larceny, misdemeanor sex crime, misdemeanor assault, petit larceny, criminal mischief, shootings, procession of drugs, firearms, and other illegal substance overall blacks and latinos being targeted not only because what they are wearing or how they but also cause of what the numbers show us. The new soon to be Major of New York Bill de Blasio has said that he is against the stop and frisk but many officers say that taking away the stop and frisk will increase crime tremendously, people are going to start to walk around with weapons, the whole point about the stop and frisk and why police officers conduct it many times is because they want the public to see that anyone can be patted down meaning that if they carry weapons with them then they will get arrested. Bill de Blasio has also said

There are many types of racism in America that cause people to make accusations against law enforcement for discrimination. One type of racism is racial profiling. It is a strategy that encourages police officers to stop and question minorities only because of their race. It takes place in a variety of routine police encounters. Unmotivated searches occur everyday among the minority groups. Could you imagine waking up and being scared to walk outside your house because of the color of your skin? This is a fear of almost everyone belonging to a minority group. This continues to be a widespread problem throughout the country.

In the case Terry v. Ohio, the defendant John Terry argued that his Fourth Amendment right was violated when a police officer conducted a search on him, and found a concealed weapon. According to the officer, he had been monitoring Terry’s actions prior to the stop in fear of his safety, thus, had enough reasonable suspicion to stop and search the defendant. The Supreme Court decided to rule in favor of the state determining that the officer may stop and frisk any suspicious person when he feels that his safety or those of others are in danger. A Terry Stop is when the police are allowed to stop, question and frisk someone they believe is behaving suspiciously (Larson, 2000). I am going to argue how police officers benefit from the Terry Stops even though on many occasions they take advantage of their power and act unethical. Essentially, it is acceptable for police officers to stop and frisk any suspicious person because it enhances the community. Furthermore, from the law enforcement perspective, any officer of the law should have a mandatory right to stop and search for weapons in order to protect themselves at all times. It is obvious that society feels that they cannot trust law enforcement because minorities are more likely to be stopped and frisk. Needless to say, it can be argued that we are one step closer to chaos. I would consider that the Supreme Court clarify and specify a little more on the stop and frisk law because ambiguity. In my opinion, anytime an

The NYPD’s stop and frisk practices raise serious concerns over racial profiling, illegal stops and privacy rights. The Departments own reports on its stop and frisk activity confirm what many people in

The stop, question, and frisk policy was implemented in the NYPD in an effort to make the city a safer place. With weapons becoming more easily accessible than ever, they are becoming more of a problem, and officers and the general public are now in more danger than ever of being killed by a firearm, knife, or a weapon. Although the policy is intended to prevent harm and protect society, it has been under major scrutiny in not only the past few years, but also the past few decades as well. Due to the fact that minorities are believed to be the main target of this policing tactic, many people have argued it is inherently corrupt should be abolished. On the other hand, it has shown to provide some positive outcomes and as a result, it is a necessary

The NYPD’s stop-and-frisk practices raise serious concerns over racial profiling, illegal stops and privacy rights. The Department’s own reports on its stop and frisk activity confirm what many people in communities of color across the city have long known: The police are stopping hundreds of thousands of law abiding New Yorkers every year, and the vast majority are black and Latino. In 2011, New Yorkers were stopped by the police 685,724 times. 605,328 were totally innocent (88 percent). 350,743 were black (53 percent). 223,740

Unreasonable, warrantless searches and seizures should not take place because it violates the Fourth Amendment of the U.S Constitution by depriving the right to privacy. A search is when an individual's privacy is violated; the privacy of an individual is violated by a Government employee or agent. When a search occurs, a warrant must be present or the privacy of the individual is deprived; one’s privacy is also deprived when a warrantless seizure occurs. The seizure of property is when the government takes possession of an individual's property. Warrantless seizures of property are mostly prohibited, unless there are justifiable expectations. The Wall Street Journal stated, "you can’t have a hundred percent security and then have a hundred

Racial profiling is an example of police brutality, which is defined by Gross and Livingston (2002) as “the practice of some officers of stopping motorists of certain racial or ethnic groups because the officer believe that these groups are more likely than others to commit certain types of crimes” (p.1413). Therefore, individuals are treated unfairly by law enforcement solely based on their race. This type of mistreatment is unmerited and ultimately a violation of an individual’s rights. However, in many instances the courts do not find it a violation of their civil rights based on the fact that racial profiling is difficult to prove. Often, prosecutors are disinclined in bringing forth a case against officers on this particular matter. Officers are permitted to stop and search individuals and their vehicles whenever there is reasonable suspicion, however, there has been studies that prove that some law enforcement officers restrict these rights primarily to minority groups. Bowling and Phillips found that although there was no formal monitoring of use of these powers, it was concluded that it was particularly heavy use of these powers against ethnic minorities, largely of young black people (as cited in Sharp & Atherton, 2007, p. 747) . In several cases, officers argue that they reasonably pulled an individual over for other probable grounds such as: traffic violations, suspicious behavior, etc., with race never being an

According to Boyette & Martinez (2013), in August 2013 Judge Shira Scheindlin of the United States District Court ruled that NYPD stop and frisk methods were unconstitutional. Stops should be based on reasonable suspicion and without racial bias or other impartiality. Evidence presented in this case, Floyd vs. City of New York, consisted of violations of citizens’ Fourth and Fourteenth amendment rights (Margeson, 2014). Scheindlin suggested that NYPD reform policies to include body worn cameras as necessary equipment for officers stationed at precincts that produced significant amounts of stops. I agree and disagree with the judge’s ruling based on the statistics and evidence presented in this case. Every citizen deserves the right to unreasonable

“One. The police stop blacks and Latinos at rates that are much higher than whites. In New York City, where people of color make up about half of the population, 80% of the NYPD stops were of blacks and Latinos. When whites were stopped, only 8% were frisked (Quigley, 2010).” Police stops are a very common effect on society. It isn’t fair that police don’t hold everyone accountable the same way. Not every cop is that way but there are that selected few who still have that racist mindset and hold it against innocent people. It’s no secret that in New York especially, there is a lot of crime and gang activity produced by different minority groups in the city. However, The facts does not provide a good reason that in routine stops are people of color targeted and frisked down compared to