Gothamist
A non-profit newsroom, powered by WNYC.
Gothamist
Listen Live
News
Testy Bloomberg Blames Press For Stop-And-Frisk Controversy
By
Ben Yakas
Published May 16, 2012
Modified May 16, 2012
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
Never miss a story
Email address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .
By
Ben Yakas
Published May 16, 2012
Modified May 16, 2012
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
We rely on your support to make local news available to all
Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2026. Donate today
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Following a press conference in City Hall today where he announced that the Mets will host the All-Star Game in 2013, Mayor Bloomberg opened up the floor to other topics in an open Q & A session. And the light-heartedness of the baseball news was soon overshadowed by questions regarding the NYPD's stop-and-frisk policy. Bloomberg made it clear that he absolutely supported stop-and-frisk, and dismissed critics as a vocal minority: "Nobody should ask Ray Kelly to apologize—he's not going to and neither am I—for saving 5,600 lives. I think it's fair to say that stop-question-and-frisk has been an essential part of the NYPD's work."
Bloomberg was first asked about today's report that a federal judge granted class-action status in a lawsuit against the NYPD that accuses the department of violating the constitutional rights of blacks and Hispanics. A testy Bloomberg deflected that: "I haven't read the decision, I couldn't respond till I read it." More questions about stop-and-frisk criticism followed though, and he answered similarly to other recent statements he's made:
As of today, we're 135 days into the year, I think we've had 135 murders. If it were to stay at this rate, we'd have 50% less than when we came into office—I can't conceive of it staying at this rate though. We continue to do everything we can that's legal to keep this city safe so you can walk in any neighborhood in this city, and not have to worry about getting shot or a bullet coming through your door...
There are too many guns all over the place, we need to get the guns out of the hands of criminals, out of the hands of people with psychiatric problems, out of the hands of minors. All three of those things we're required to do by federal law. We have tactics we believe are acceptable under the law, approved by the courts and by settlements.
Bloomberg answered questions about minimum wage laws and Christine Quinn's mayoral hopes ("Quinn is very competent and would be a very good mayor.") before he was thrown another question about stop-and-frisk. He began to focus his ire on the reporters in the room when asked whether he was disheartened about the level of controversy over the policy:
If it wasn't for you reporting on a handful of people who are very vocal, I don't get that sense. And when you do polling, my understanding is that the polls show overwhelming support by the public for the tactics we've been using to bring down crime. There's always going to be somebody who disagrees, and they have a right, but if you were ever to do a balanced story, I think you'd find that it's a minority of people who don't like the tactic. We're very careful to follow the law. We go where the crime is...Maybe someday we won't have the crime, but right now we unfortunately do in certain communities, that's where we focus our efforts.
Attention switched again, this time to questions about the city's developing IT industry, boxing matches, and the teacher's union ("They're always trying to stop improving the schools...The union's job is to get the most money for the least work in the best working conditions for their members—not to run the school system"). It seemed as though Bloomberg was completely done discussing stop-and-frisk today—but apropos of nothing, he returned to the subject with an even clearer statement of approval:
We've been in office for a little over 10 years. When we came into office, people always thought that crime was at rock bottom, and it couldn't go any lower. I think conventional wisdom was that crime would go up in this city. If that had been true, and if we had just held onto the gains that Rudy Giuliani's administration brought to the city—and he did dramatically reduce the crime—there'd be another 5,600 people dead today. Instead those people are alive, and the data shows incidentally that 90% of those people would have been black or Hispanic.
Nobody should ask Ray Kelly to apologize—he's not going to and neither am I—for saving 5600 lives. I think it's fair to say that stop-question-and-frisk has been an essential part of the NYPD's work, it's taken more than 6,000 guns off the streets in the last eight years. This year we're on pace to have the lowest number of murders in recorded history, and not just by a little, but by a lot. We are not going to do anything that undermines that trend, or threatens public safety. We are the safest big city in the country, and we are determined to keep it that way...
If you went out and surveyed the public, you'd find overwhelming support for what we're doing. And a handful of people who have a right to express themselves feel differently. But some people write that there's nothing the cops can do that would be acceptable, other than turn the streets over, to bring it back to 2,200 murders a year. We're not going to do that.
According to recent reports, the NYPD is on pace to break last year's record 601,055 stop-and-frisks (that's 1,900 people a day) in 2012.
Tagged
bloomberg
cops
mayor bloomberg
nypd
police
stop and frisk
Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
Read more
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
MORE news
Tompkins Square Park is getting a makeover. Some say it's too much.
Some regulars at the East Village park want to preserve its not-so-fancy offerings.
By
Willow Higgins
Published Oct 17, 2026 at 7:00 a.m. ET
Deer are all over New Jersey roads looking for sex, state officials warn
Mid-October through mid-December is deer mating season, which can be a danger to drivers as the sex-seeking creatures cross roadways throughout the Garden State.
By
Rosemary Misdary
News
Deer are all over New Jersey roads looking for sex, state officials warn
Mid-October through mid-December is deer mating season, which can be a danger to drivers as the sex-seeking creatures cross roadways throughout the Garden State.
By
Rosemary Misdary
Man messaged 'I got straight poison' before giving NYC college students fentanyl, feds say
By
Samantha Max
Inside the plan to fix the nearly collapsed Pfizer Building, 1/64th of an inch at a time
By
David Brand
School bus carrying autistic students got lost in Brooklyn for 4 hours last year
By
Jessica Gould
Never miss a story
Catch up on the most important headlines with a roundup of essential NYC stories, delivered to your inbox daily.
Sign upEmail address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .