The unlawful stopping and and frisking of people of color in NYC has been a problem for over a decade now, but technology and the current anti-Latino and anti-immigrant climate raise the stakes for these communities, our communities.

The NY Civil Liberties Union filed a class action lawsuit against the New York City Police Department over the racial profiling during increased stop and frisk operations in NYC (over 80% of those stopped are Black or Latino) and over the fact that regardless if those stopped are found doing something “criminal” or not, their names are entered in an NYPD database to be kept indefinitely creating a class of permanently criminal residents.

One of the plaintiffs named in the lawsuit and featured in the video above, which I got from Gothamist, is Clive Lino, a 29-year-old graduate student studying English and special education at Mercy College, was stopped at least 13 times by NYPD officers between February 2008 and August 2009. 13 times is less than a year!

The implications for this in the wider context of the growing criminalization of Latinos and immigrants are huge. While in Arizona, SB1070 has been amended so that only those stopped by law enforcement can be asked for their immigration status, the situation in NYC shows that this still equals open-season on people of color communities. This is racial profiling, plain and simple.

In a feature in this week’s New York Magazine, NYPD head, Ray Kelly is quoted as saying, “The tactic is a lifesaver. Critics complain ‘the stops don’t represent the demographics of the city.’ Well, no kidding. Otherwise half the people we stop would be women. Does that make sense to anybody?”

What doesn’t make sense is that data shows more guns recovered from whites than people of color. What doesn’t make sense is how NYC Mayor Bloomberg can publicly denounce SB1070, while his police head provides the tactical framework being used in Arizona and being looked at as a model in other jurisdictions.

Currently, the anti-SB1070 movement is using the phrase “Do I look illegal?” to push back. The situation in Arizona and New York City proves that if you are brown, the answer is yes.