As a mother of male youth, I feel the time is coming to equip him with the sad fact of police stop and search policies. What experience have you had and even if you haven't what advice is best.

Black people 'facing more searches'
31.10.07

ThisisLondon


Black people were seven times more likely than whites to be stopped and search by the police last year, official figures showed on Tuesday.

Ministry of Justice data showed the rate was even more disproportionate than the previous year, when it stood at six times more likely.

Asians were about twice as likely to be stopped and searched - about the same as the previous year.

The increase in the number of stops on ethnic minorities was partly explained by the police response to the July 7 bombings, the report said.

There were 878,153 stops and searches recorded by police in the year, up 3% on the previous 12 months.

Most of this rise was due to an extra 14,000 black people being targeted by stop and search - a 12% rise - and a 14% increase in the number of Asians targeted, it said.

"This increase could be explained, in part, by the London bombings," said the document.

Stop and searches conducted under anti-terror powers rocketed by 34% in the year to 44,500, added the paper.

This included an 84% rise in the number of Asians stopped and searched under counter-terror measures, and a 51% increase in blacks targeted under the measures.

However, a separate document also published by the Government on Tuesday gave the number of stops and searches under anti-terror powers as just over 50,000, rather than the 44,500 given in the first publication. It revealed that those 50,000 stops led to just 563 arrests.

A further article from the BBC news site: Is the increasa in stop and search justified when linked to reducing gun crime?


Call to increase stop and search

Guns
There have been a number of recent high-profile shootings

Jarrett on searches
More young people should be stopped and searched to help tackle knife and gun crime, a leading black police representative says.

Keith Jarrett, the outgoing president of the National Black Police Association (NBPA), said he would be pressing police for such an approach.

He said: "The black community is telling me we have to look at this."

Some senior black police officers have criticised the suggestion fearing it could lead to racial profiling.

Black people are six times more likely to be stopped than white people, according to Home Office figures.

This disparity has led to continued charges of police racism and critics say that increased use of stop and search tactics would inevitably affect the black community disproportionately.

'Victims and perpetrators'

Mr Jarrett will use a speech at the NBPA's annual conference this week to ask Police Minister Tony McNulty and Metropolitan Police chief Sir Ian Blair to consider searching more young people.

The suggestion contradicts the approach taken by the NBPA to date which has questioned the high proportion of black people stopped and searched by police.

Mr Jarrett told BBC News 24: "It's not that we should stop and search more black youths. It's not just black people that carry weapons, white people carry weapons as well.

"I am saying the police service should stop young people because young people are the victims of, and the perpetrators of, a lot of these crimes."

Mr Jarrett said he was reflecting the feelings of the black community who believed stop and search was an effective way of disrupting gangs and reducing violence.


Where the community cooperate and want this, then there should be bravery by the police in terms of being able to do it
David Blunkett
Former Home Secretary

But he acknowledged that it might increase tension in some communities because it was "not as sharp a tool" as police would like.

"It's not going to go down very well with my audience, many of whom are going to be black," he said.

The NBPA's legal adviser, Ch Supt Ali Dizaei, told the BBC the comments were Mr Jarrett's personal views.

He said stop and search was "a very, very small part" of the fight against knife and gun crime and increasing its use would be "wrong".

"I think that [it] will increase tension in the black community," Mr Dizaei said.

But former Home Secretary David Blunkett told the BBC: "I think Keith Jarrett, from the experience he's had, is right that where the community cooperate and want this, then there should be bravery by the police in terms of being able to do it.

"In other words, they shouldn't back off just because they're having to deal with a situation where you've got black-on-black crime."

Race riots

The Macpherson Report, published in February 1999 into the murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence in London, strongly criticised the use of stop and search by police officers.


It risks alienating black communities further
Milena Buyum
National Assembly Against Racism

Its use is considered to have been a major factor in precipitating the inner-city race riots of the 1980s.

Mr Jarrett told The Observer: "From the return that I am getting from a lot of black people, they want to stop these killings, these knife crimes, and if it means their sons and daughters are going to be inconvenienced by being stopped by the police, so be it."

He said he would not oppose a random use of stop-and-search in situations where officers had "reasonable suspicion" that an offence had been committed.

But Milena Buyum, coordinator of the National Assembly Against Racism, said the tactic disproportionately affected the black community.

"It risks alienating black communities further and is not a very effective way of catching people who are likely to commit offences."

Stop and search is as sharp as a blunt stone. How many guns do they think people are walking routinely about with or do they think people are stupid.

As a youth it used to happen all the time. As a older man very little. My advice is if it does happen ask a member of the public to be a witness especially when they're putting hands in your pockets.. and find out the law surrounding what they can do and cant do. Nothing a policeman hates more than when being quoted section x/ regarding stop and search.

I won £5000 in the early 90s from the police for false imprisonment ( not a real prison ) after a routine stop and search. Its a pound per minute. Can end up a nice little earner if they dont do their job properly.

Do you think it would be a good idea to produce a booklet for young people to be able to refer to? Would youth benefit from knowing (in brief words) what they should say, could do etc... if in that predicament. Do you know if there's anything like that already out there?

There is one already. I picked up a booklet at a stall at the Marus Garvey Black Family Day event it Camberwell.


The booklet is here http://police.homeoffice.gov.uk/news...df?view=Binary



This may help you

Stop and Search | Welcome to Stop and Search

Stop and search:Stop and Search


Your Rights: Stop and search: Stop and Search



This one is more detailed http://police.homeoffice.gov.uk/news...df?view=Binary

Femergy

In a word yes. Judge has done the work for you. Maybe you could condense it into a few pages for your son.

yes when i was 17 the copper tried to 'speak yuff' talk back he came over as being rude...

Sad to say it but... they should bring back stop and search.

Bit of a defeating statement after all that the previous generation fought for but too many people don't know just how bad the youths out there are getting.

The problem with all this stop and search talk is that they're making it out as though we're the only ones causing trouble when those white kids and even the eastern europeans are just as bad... sometimes worse as theres no underlying reason for them to behave in the way they do.

InI youths need some grown ass ex crook type cats to be out there roaming the street Black vigilante style, like the New Black Panthers. They'll respect you if you know how to handle them, if the state wasn't so keen on stripping people of their rights (citizens arrest etc) we'd be able to sort ourselves out.

Oh yeah... the standard police officers aren't that bad, can put them in their place with a bit of know how, chill, let them do their job and they''re alright (for the most part) but those CID officers are the worst. They're of the American police type mindset, if they can tell you're relying on a booklet to, ''defend yourself'' you'll be lucky if they don't check for the street cameras and straight take it from you. For real. If they spot you don't know your rights or aren't holding up enough of the economy to cause them any trouble they'll rough you up arrest you for some crap and walk off laughing.

Gwan like they're power mad.

I disagree with you Black Lion.

The police have already been carrying out Stop and Searches on our youths OFFICIALLY and UNOFFICIALLY, and have been using HEAVY HANDED TACTICS, for as long as I can rememeber.

Stop and Search has been taking place on the Black Ccmmunity since the Notting Hill Riots....or even earlier

Yep ain't nothing new under the sun with regard to this matter. I'm just trying to figure out if anything has changed since the 80's e.g. causes, reasons for stopping etc.... What has remained constant is the disproportionate numbers of black male youths that are being stopped. My generation rioted blood over this in the 80's .... where is it going to lead to this time?? Does the establishment think that we have gone away, that we don't remember and that there is concern from us about where things can lead to this time round?? The have waited for our children to grow up and now they are doing to them what they did to us. Are we fools to be sitting back and not holding the authorities to account.

Fem'