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The Case Of Terry Vs Ohio

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Ever since 1968 and the Supreme Court case of “Terry vs Ohio” was settled, stop and frisking policies have been used by police everywhere in the United States. However, lately the use of this tactic, especially in New York, has raised the questions of whether or not these stop and frisks are actually helping as well as the question of whether or not these supposed random stops are unbiased. There have been a great number of arguments for the continuation of stop and frisk policies as well as the cease of such tactics to lower the crime rate in cities. In New York, these concerns were first brought to light in the late 1990’s. Throughout this decade, the huge decrease in crime rates had been credited to the fact that NYPD had taken the stop and frisk policies very seriously. However, “near the end of the decade there were repeated complaints of harassment of minority communities” (Gelman). The people of New York were complaining that the NYPD were stopping people and treating people differently based on their ethnic background, which brings up the bigger and more disturbing question; Were the police stopping minorities based on racial bias? To better look at the history of the practice of stopping and frisking and how it evolved into what it is today, it would be best to more fully define when it is ok for police officers to stop and frisk people. According to the 4th Amendment, it is constitutional for police officers to detain and search people if there is

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