A federal appellate court denied a request from the City of New York to vacate a ruling mandating changes in the New York City Police Department’s stop-and-frisk practice. The court’s refusal to vacate the ruling, issued in August by U.S. District Judge Schira Scheindlin, came just weeks after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit blocked Scheindlin’s order and removed her from the case, claiming that she “ran afoul of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges” by making public statements about the case while it was pending.
The ruling comes as time runs out for the Bloomberg Administration, with Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio set to take the reins of power on January 1. The Mayor-elect made reform of stop-and-frisk a centerpiece of his campaign; incumbent Michael Bloomberg has fought for, and expanded, stop-and-frisk during his nearly 12 years in office.
New York City Corporation Counsel Michael Cordozo told The New York Times that “the city is moving ahead full speed with its appeal, and we maintain that the city’s police force has acted lawfully in its application of stop, question and frisk.”
de Blasio spokeswoman Lis Smith told the Times that de Blasio’s position is that “we must move forward on making fundamental reforms to stop-and-frisk. By ending the overuse of this practice, we will make New York safer and begin to repair the relationships between community and police.”