This has to try and work under the conditions set by the 4th amendment; police must a have a legitimate cause to search, a reasonable suspicion that a crime has been, is being, or is about to be committed before stopping a suspect.  If the police reasonably suspect the person is armed and dangerous, they may conduct a frisk.

But let's say you are stopped and haven't been stopped before. Is there a list of rules you should follow?

Not exactly, but you should do a few things in order to make the process brief and amicable:

1. Remind yourself of your 4th amendment rights; they need to have reasonable suspicion in order to search your person.

2. Do not try to attract attention to yourself, or attack the police officer, no matter how outrageous you think the stop is.

3. You are NOT required to carry ID on you in the state of New York, nor do you have to show ID. They may ask for it if you are arrested or issued a summons, however, in which case they will detain you until they get a positive identification on you.

4. Do not resist or run away, that just looks even more suspicious.

5. Ask the officer if you are free to go or under arrest.

But what do the statistics say about Stop and Frisk rates? Here is a nice graph showing stops by race. (Direct statistics from the NYPD)

Good question, me! It is important to note the difference between stops and seizures. A stop is just the initial frisk, which seems to be more common for blacks and hispanics. Seizures, however, are when the police officer has stopped a civilian and actually found illicit materials on them. 

Here's a graph showing seizures by race. (Direct statistics from the NYPD)

If you are Pro-Stop and Frisk, then these numbers are either meaningless to you or you feel that they are misleading. There have been many reports (especially from the New York Post) of people arguing for Stop and Frisk to come to their neighborhoods. These reports are understandable too, as a number of them are coming from families of people who were murdered or assaulted in the recent months. If you have experienced or witnessed a murder or assault in your neighborhood, you too would ask for more police influence to stop people from carrying weapons. The NYPD backs up these reports as well; NPR had a special report in 2013 where the NYPD's leading attorney, Heidi Grossman, was interviewed. In this report, there was a very nice summary of how the city views the issue and explained why there is room for Stop and Frisk here in NYC. Essentially, the numbers don't seem to tell the whole story, as there is no direct proof of people being stopped due to their race, but rather, the places where Stop and Frisk is focused happens to be in communities that are predominantly black/hispanic. That would explain why approx. 80% of stops by race are of black/hispanic civilians.

But what about the other graph? It shows that despite the large amount of stops, there is a disproportionate amount of them when compared to seizures. For Whites, the ratio of Stops to Seizures is 27:1. For Hispanics, it is 99:1 and for Blacks, it is 143:1. There is undeniably a discrepancy between the number of Stops and Seizures, but two arguments can be made against these numbers. Firstly, they again don't tell the whole story. There are many times where someone looks suspicious or has malicious intent, but is not carrying any contraband on them. Those stops are much frequent than stops where there is contraband found and seized. Secondly, and much more telling, is the fact that the number of seizures is very close. In fact, Blacks and Whites are both at around 16,000 seizures while Hispanics are at 14,000. This shows that seizure rates are more closely proportional between races than stops are. To further this argument, Whites are also more often found carrying drugs and other weapons (knives/blades), rather than guns which are more prevalent around blacks. What this speaks to is the same concern of the earlier argument by Heidi Grossman, where people are requesting stop and frisk in their neighborhoods. More lives are found endangered where there are guns rather than where there are drugs, so communities where weapons are more prevalent will get more attention and more stops.

If you are Against Stop and Frisk, you are probably shocked by these inexplicable discrepancies in statistics. Those who argue against Stop and Frisk usually side towards an argument I like to call "80-90." What this name highlights is that 80% of stops are amongst Black/Hispanics and more than 90% of the time, civilians stopped are innocent. This brings into question the effectiveness of Stop-and-Frisk, because 9/10 times the civilian is innocent, yet there is still a grossly disproportionate number of stops between Blacks and Whites. The statistics for seizures is very helpful for highlighting this. If you look at the number of seizures amongst blacks hispanics and whites, the numbers are very close. In fact, blacks and whites are equal at 16,000 seizures while hispanics trail behind at 14,000 seizures. This blatantly shows that just as many whites are found with contraband as blacks are, and are just as likely to be carrying contraband. This is somewhat odd, as this 1:1 ratio is nowhere near reflected in the number of stops. 2.3 million blacks were stopped to gain 16,000 seizures, meanwhile an appallingly low 435,000 whites were stopped to achieve 16,000 seizures. That 1:1 ratio of seizures just became a 5.3:1 ratio, which is even more shocking when considering the fact that it takes 143 stops to seize 1 black person, while it is drastically more common to seize whites at 27 stops per seizure. There is no true justification for that massive discrepancy; whites are statistically more prone to seizures, yet are stopped nowhere near as often.

There are plenty of other arguments that also revolve around many other statistics. Some of these arguments are less concrete than others and they include, but are not limited to:

• In 23 percent of the stops of blacks, and 24 percent of the stops of Hispanics, the officer recorded using force, whereas the number for whites was only 17 percent. More force used with people of color opens up suspicion to racial profiling, but can be attributed to the larger amount of people stopped.
• Between 2004 and 2009, the percentage of stops where the officer failed to state a specific suspected crime rose from 1 percent to 36 percent. This is highly questionable. If the system is based off of reasonable suspicion, the officer should find it rather easy to state a suspected crime.
• Weapons were seized in 1.0 percent of the stops of blacks, 1.1 percent of the stops of Hispanics, and 1.4 percent of the stops of whites. Contraband other than weapons was seized in 1.8 percent of the stops of blacks, 1.7 percent of the stops of Hispanics, and 2.3 percent of the stops of whites. This is not a trick set of stats, they are admittedly very small numbers, almost negligibly small. But they shouldn't be this small; if stops are based on reasonable suspicion, stops should be much more efficient at seizing contraband.

If Stop and Frisk is to continue being an NYPD Policy, it must be much less controversial. The reality is that It has not been as effective as it should be over the years. Actually, it seems to be less efficient, seeing as the number of stops have increased, yet a very small percentage of stops result in seizures. There also should be no room to argue that there is racial profiling involved.

New policies have been approved to fix these issues. There will be trainings, especially for new police officers, that enforce and clarify the idea of reasonable suspicion, and also provide a very large amount of information regarding racial discrimination. Hopefully, this much needed refresh will improve the condition of the Stop and Frisk system.