As Gov. David Paterson prepares to sign a bill banning police from compiling the names and addresses of the hundreds of thousands of people they stop each year who aren’t arrested, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly says another crime is underway.
“Albany has robbed us of a great crime-fighting tool, one that saved lives,” Kelly said in a statement. “Without it, there will be, inevitably, killers and other criminals who won’t be captured as quickly or perhaps ever. They’ll be free to threaten our neighborhoods longer than they would have been otherwise.”
Despite the best efforts of City Hall to discourage them, lawmakers passed a bill last night banning certain elements of the controversial stop-and-frisk database, which retains personal information, including names, addresses and Social Security numbers of people who are stopped but not necessarily charged with a crime.
Critics believe it’s been unfairly used to target black and Latino populations and violates individuals’ right to privacy.
Read more on NBC New York.