A New York appeals court dealt another blow to stop-and-frisk today when they ruled against the NYPD in a gun possession case involving a 14-year-old. Officers stopped the Bronx boy in 2010, thinking he was skipping school, but did not have “a reasonable suspicion” that he was both armed and involved in criminal activity, the court said, reversing an earlier ruling. “The gradual erosion of this basic liberty can only tatter the constitutional fabric upon which this nation was built,” wrote Justice Peter Tom for the 3-2 majority. “The ramifications go beyond this single case.” The strong wording echoes a Federal District Court judge’s handling of a class action stop-and-frisk suit, in which she noted the department’s “deeply troubling apathy towards New Yorkers’ most fundamental constitutional rights.”
