A spokesperson for the city’s law department, Nicholas Paolucci, said the settlement agreement “was limited to these individual plaintiffs and does not indicate a broad issue.”
Some law enforcement unions and pro-police elected officials lamented the loss of a tactic that they say has been vital to getting suspected criminals off the streets. Historically, police departments have used the suspicion of a relatively minor infraction — the smell of marijuana or a busted taillight, for example — as a pretext to dig into a person’s past, scouring databases for open warrants and what the NYPD calls investigation cards, or I-Cards.
Belle said four plainclothes officers surrounded him as he walked home from the subway and searched him. The officers told him they were looking for a gun, he said, and after not finding one, demanded his ID and conducted a warrant check.
Ridiculous it’s called police work.