NYPD ends tactic of prolonging stops to check for warrants

By MICHAEL R. SISAK
Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — The New York City police department reached a legal settlement Friday that requires it to abandon a practice in which officers use prolonged street stops to check for arrest warrants and ties to other cases, a tactic critics denounced as “digital stop and frisk.” Under the settlement, officers will only be permitted to conduct warrant searches during street stops if they have “reasonable suspicion” that the person stopped “was committing, committed or is about to commit” a crime or if there’s probable cause that they’ve done so. The NYPD has revised its stop policy and is conducting training. A spokesperson for the city’s law department said the settlement agreement “was in the best interest of all parties.”