Citing Federal Judge Shira Scheindlin's decision, Allen
Moye, 54, alleges the NYPD profiled him and arrested him on bogus charges in
Harlem as he waited for a friend on a street corner in September 2010.
A legally blind black man busted three years ago in Harlem
became the first stop-and-frisk target to sue the city for false arrest since a
federal court ruling against the practice.
Allen Moye, 54, alleged the NYPD arrested him on bogus
charges as he waited for a friend on a street corner in September 2010.
“It was racial profiling, what they did,” Moye said
Thursday. “... It’s a different Jim Crow. They try to put everybody behind bars
to do their work.”
His lawsuit specifically cites Federal Judge Shira
Scheindlin's decision as indicative of the NYPD’s disregard for the rights of
minorities.
The department’s “unconstitutional policies of profiling
minorities may be inferred by the Aug. 12, 2013 decision ... finding that the
NYPD had violated the rights of thousands of citizens with respect to the
application of its stop and frisk policy,” the suit said.
In her ruling, Scheindlin found that city cops were making
“unconstitutional stops and conducting unconstitutional frisks” that targeted
young black and Hispanic men.
Queens resident Moye, in his Manhattan lawsuit, said that he
was profiled by police and taken into custody after complaining about the
NYPD’s search
Allen Moye faced charges related to credit card forgery, but
all the counts were dismissed five months later.
Moye, who wears glasses and occasionally uses a cane to get
around, was waiting for a friend around 4 p.m. on W. 118th St. when police
approached him.
The officers “snatched his identification from him,” the
lawsuit said. “When Allen complained, the police spoke rudely to him and placed
him under arrest.”
The lawsuit alleged that Moye’s arms were wrenched behind
his back before he was handcuffed and held in a police van for several hours.
“They treated me like I was from another planet, like I just
landed in a space ship,” Moye said. “They said they didn’t care about the
Fourth Amendment.
“The one cop was crazy. If this had happened at night, I
would have been killed.”
Moye, the father of seven sons, said he and his offspring
were all previous targets of NYPD stop-and-frisk “just for being black
walking.”
Moye faced charges related to credit card forgery, but all
the counts were dismissed five months later.
The NYPD “intentionally conspired to fabricate evidence
against him, including omitting and manipulating evidence ... fabricating
evidence and concealing exculpatory evidence,” his lawsuit said.
