Crime and No Punishment

The New York Sun comments on the state of New York passing a new law to prevent the New York Police Department from using its database of information gathered from its stop and frisk efforts. The database has been used to produce the past 18 months over 170 arrests, including 17 murders, 7 rapes, 11 shootings, and 36 robberies.

I'm not surprised that the leftists in New York have, given the outrage vented over the Arizona immigration law which is less troublesome than New York City's stop and frisk policy, have put these restrictions in place.

When the left had its way with New York City's mayoral and police administration, crime rates soared, culminating in 1990 with over 2,200 murders. In 2009, fewer than 500 murders occurred. Not only did this save great suffering upon the part of the people not killed and their families, but it has led to a remarkable renaissance in New York as many people no longer fear living, working, or visiting the city.

Many factors no doubt contributed to this decline in crime, including stopping people who the police under a "reasonable suspicion" standard and frisk them. Not only are some arrested from these stop and frisk encounters, but the policy's biggest impact is probably as a deterrent to people carrying weapons - if you know the police may stop you, you are less likely to carry a weapon that can get you arrested. Moreover, the data derived from these encounters has gone into a database to investigate future crimes.

Retreating from the policies that save lives and make New York safer may make leftists feel better. Unfortunately, it makes all of us less safe.