U.S. district judge Shira Scheindlin granted class-action certification to a stop-and-frisk lawsuit against the city of New York, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg. The plaintiffs allege that the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk policy regularly violates the Constitution by illegally stopping and searching scores of people belonging to a particular demographic — black and Latino. Pending the city’s appeal, the class-action ruling will put stop-and-frisk on trial.

Plaintiffs in Floyd et al. vs City of New York also argue that they were stopped by police who did not have the legally necessary “reasonable suspicion” that they had committed or were going to commit a crime. What’s more, the suit alleges, police often performed frisks, but not because they saw a bulge they suspected to be a weapon, another legal requirement.

In her written decision, Scheindlin said the alleged constitutional violations result not from the actions of rogue officers, but from a policy handed down from the very top. “The stop-and-frisk program is centralized and hierarchical,” said Scheindlin. “Those stops were made pursuant to a policy that is designed, implemented and monitored by the NYPD’s administration.”

Scheindlin’s ruling cites “overwhelming evidence” — a spike in stop-and-frisks and the NYPD’s own words — indicating that at the “highest levels of the department” police are enforcing a policy that leaves behind a trail of daily injustices.

For years, Mayor Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Kelly have used distortions and misinformation to promote and justify a policy that violates the constitutional rights of those who were stopped. Now, the Scheindlin findings have exposed the NYPD game for what it is, an illegal system of quotas and racial profiling imposed on field police from the top of the NYPD.

“Suspicionless stops should never occur,” Scheindlin wrote in her decision, adding that, “Defendants’ cavalier attitude towards the prospect of a ‘widespread practice of suspicionless stops’ displays a deeply troubling apathy towards New Yorkers’ most fundamental constitutional rights.” Stop-and-frisk, which the data shows is a form of racial profiling, violates not only the Fourth Amendment — protection from unreasonable searches — but also the 14th Amendment, which includes the equal protection clause, the plaintiffs charge.

The Scheindlin decision was informative and comprehensive, including a number of important facts and observations. Here are eight important points from the decision.

1. Soaring numbers. The rate of stops has grown exponentially under the Bloomberg administration. Scheindlin’s ruling notes that police conducted 2.8 million documented stops of people between 2004 and 2009, about half of whom were frisked. In contrast, in 1998, Scheindlin explains, NYPD officers made roughly 150,000 stops per year. In 2004 alone, officers recorded more than 313,000 stops, “and since then the number has increased every year except 2007, rising to over 684,000 in 2011.” Scheindlin cites the large increase as evidence of a centralized policy change.

2. No reasonable suspicion. Reasonable suspicion that a person is involved in a crime is necessary for a legal stop. Eighty-eight percent of those stopped, however, are not charged with any crime. As Scheindlin noted, the data shows that “according to their own records and judgment, officers’ ‘suspicions’ were wrong nearly nine times out of ten.”

3. Imaginary bulges. Officers’ suspicions were similarly unsubstantiated when reportedly searching for guns. A “suspicious bulge” was cited as a reason for about 10 percent of all stops, but guns were seized in less than 1 percent. “For every 69 stops that police officers justified specifically on the basis of a suspicious bulge, they found one gun,” the decision notes.

4. Stops for no reason. The absence of a legally necessary, interpretable “suspected crime” cited on official forms grew from 1.1 percent in 2004 to 35.9 percent (more than 200,000 reported stops) in 2009. During those years, “Overall, in more than half a million documented stops — 18.4 percent of the total — officers listed no coherent suspected crime,” Scheindlin wrote, meaning they either ignored the section altogether or did not cite suspected behavior that is indeed illegal.

5. Unlawful stops. Scheindlin writes, “According to their own explanations for their actions, NYPD officers conducted at least 170,000 unlawful stops between 2004 and 2009.” Stops based on nothing more than “furtive movement” or a “high-crime area” were the justifications of at least 100,000 stops, but as Scheindlin says, are illegal due to the Fourth Amendment law protecting Americans from unreasonable search.

6. Racial profiling. The NYPD’s stop-and-frisk program targets blacks and Latinos because of their skin color. Scheindlin admitted the testimony of Columbia University professor Jeffrey Fagan, who found that police stopped blacks and Latinos far more than white residents. Isolated from other factors like crime rates and neighborhood racial composition, racial disparity from racial targeting was statistically significant, strongly underscoring that skin color is the essential factor in determining who gets stopped and throwing weight behind allegations of 14th Amendment violations. Fagan’s research also found that “the search for weapons is (a) unrelated to crime, (b) takes place primarily where weapons offenses are less frequent than other crimes, and (c) is targeted at places where the black and Hispanic populations are highest.” Cops are more likely to list no suspected crime category, or what Scheindlin called “an incoherent one,” like “furtive movements,” when stopping blacks and Latinos than when stopping whites. They also are more likely to use force against people of color.

7. NYPD illegal quotas. Scheindlin links the rising number of stops and the targeting of black and Latinos to NYPD quotas and to Commissioner Kelly’s own admission that the NYPD has a quota policy, albeit disguised. In a recent operations order, Commissioner Kelly explained departmental policy under the euphemism “performance goal.” Kelly said in the order, “Department managers can and must set performance goals,” for “the issuance of summonses, the stopping and questioning of suspicious individuals, and the arrests of criminals.”

The order also explains a weekly review during which a sergeant compares each officer’s monthly “activity” with the “daily assignment,” whereby police who “do not demonstrate activities” — or keep their numbers up — “will be evaluated accordingly and their assignments re-assessed.” In other words, there will be consequences for officers who don’t meet quotas, even though New York labor law says penalizing cops for failing to meet quotas is illegal.

Former NYPD officers turned whistleblowers Adhyl Polanco and Adrian Schoolcraft have collected evidence documenting NYPD quotas in practice. From 2008 to 2009, Polanco, from the 41st Precinct, and Schoolcraft, from the 81st, recorded roll calls revealing supervisors’ and other high-ranking officers’ enforcement of quotas. In Scheindlin’s own words, Schoolcraft’s audio files expose supervisors “repeatedly telling officers to conduct unlawful stops and arrests and explaining that the instructions for higher performance numbers are coming down the chain of command.”

Similarly, Polanco testified that “his commanding officers announced specific quotas for arrests and summons (quotas that rose dramatically between early 2008 and 2009) and for UF-250s” (a term for the forms used in stops), said Scheindlin, “and threatened overtime and undesirable assignments for those who failed to meet them.”

8. Repeat performances. According to the NYCLU, in 2011 the NYPD stopped more young, black men than live in New York; that is, some individuals are stopped and frisked repeatedly. To protect their rights, plaintiffs are seeking “systemic relief” — an end to the unconstitutional practice of stop-and-frisk.

Kristen Gwynne covers drugs at AlterNet. She graduated from New York University with a degree in journalism and psychology.

The area was evacuated for two hours until a bomb squad determined that the device was not dangerous.

At about 2 a.m. Saturday, a police officer discovered Miyakawa on a ladder not far from where the first contraption was found. Police said he was tying a similar “I Love New York” bag to a public lamp post.

Miyakawa was charged with two counts of first-degree reckless endangerment, two counts of placing a false bomb or hazardous substance in the first degree, two counts of placing a false bomb or hazardous substance in the second degree, two counts of second-degree reckless endangerment and two counts of second-degree criminal nuisance.

A judge ordered him held pending a psychiatric evaluation. His lawyer, Deborah J. Blum, said Monday that she is filing for emergency relief to have Miyakawa released. A court date was set for June 21 to review the results of the evaluation.

“He’s still being held,” Blum said Monday. “I believe that it was a gross misunderstanding and other than that I don’t have any other comment.”

Miyakawa, who was born in Tokyo and is about 50 years old, has worked for a New York-based architect Rafael Vinoly for the last 20 years and also has an independent design practice.

Vinoly’s firm released a statement Monday praising Miyakawa for his “extraordinary brand of professionalism” and said he has been a mentor to generations of young architects.

“Takeshi is a fabulous human being and a person of extraordinary talent,” Vinoly said. “We hope this misunderstanding is cleared up as quickly as possible.”

New York Civil Liberties Union Executive Director Donna Lieberman said in a statement that the charges sounded “like a wild overreaction.”

“It’s hard to understand why a light-up bag in a tree would be treated as an attempted terrorist act unless there’s more to the story than has been reported in the press thus far,” she said.

In 2007, an artist touched off a terror scare in Boston by placing electronic devices around the city as part of a marketing stunt for Cartoon Network. The city closed bridges, roads and public transit before authorities realized the signs were not bombs.

On an average day, the NYPD receives nearly 100 reports of a suspicious package. Last year, there were more than 4,000 such reports. The number generally rises following any word of terror threats in New York and around the world.

It’s beyond the purview of these paragraphs to explain the many reasons someone might take to the streets and shout “fuck the police!” However, as a new report from the New York Civil Liberties Union confirms, the consistently racist practices of the NYPD should make fierce anti-police sentiments understandable, even for those who find such an attitude unpalatable.

Using the NYPD’s own statistics, the NYCLU report highlights what they describe as a “two-tiered” policing system, in which black and Latino New Yorkers receive very different treatment from whites. Perhaps the most shocking finding of all: There were more stops of African-American young men in 2011 than there are African-American men living in the city — and nine out of 10 of those stopped had committed no crime.

In nearly half of New York’s 76 police precincts, black and Latino New Yorkers accounted for more than 90 percent of those stopped; in almost all precincts black and Latinos accounted for more than half of stops. Furthermore, frisks, which are only supposed to take place if police suspect someone is carrying a weapon, occurred far more often if the person stopped was black or Latino, even though white people were found more often to be carrying weapons. The report also notes that despite the 600 percent increase in stop-and-frisks under Mayor Bloomberg, the number of guns recovered has not increased proportionately.

“This cannot stand. Real people’s lives are in the balance. Whole generations of boys and girls are growing up afraid of the very people that are supposed to be keeping them safe,” Donna Lieberman, executive director of the NYCLU, told press on Wednesday.

Is it a surprise, then, that in a march of 5,000 predominantly non-white New Yorkers organized to call for justice for the murdered Trayvon Martin, with Occupy support, that chants moved smoothly from “We are Trayvon Martin!” to “Fuck the Police!”? The greater surprise should perhaps be why more people don’t feel angry at the NYPD. Of course, many will continue to disagree with anti-police marches. However, when statistics on policing show what the NYCLU’s Lieberman called “a tale of two cities,” disagreements should only arise over tactics to redress this system; it seems there’s an overwhelming case for fury at the police.

In a statement, NYPD spokesman Paul Browne defended police practices, saying that “stops save lives” and that New York has this year seen a record low for murders. He said that it is “the safest big city in America,” which prompts the question: safe for whom? When vast swaths of New York’s population live in constant fear of being harassed by a well-armed, uniformed gang — and that this fear is largely contingent on a person’s skin color — this strikes me as the sort of safety I have no interest in maintaining.

Ample ink has already been spilled (outside the mainstream press, that is) about May 1, some praising Occupy’s success in staging events like teach-ins and the permitted solidarity march, which garnered a diversity of support from union and community groups; some point out the obvious — that no May Day actions actually shut down any of America’s vast metropolises; some have decried the property damage carried out by participants in Seattle; Reuters first reported the day as a “dud” and then recanted, noting it “far from a dud.” We could debate forever, using different, incommensurable metrics, as to whether May Day was or was not successful. But when I think about my Tuesday on strike, my memory is of New York City shrouded in an impenetrable blanket of police.

Having reported on, and participated in Occupy actions for seven months, heavy police presence is by no means unusual. Cops routinely flank banks when protests are called outside, they surround squares where Occupy groups gather, and are swift to disperse any attempts (even when legal) to assemble against capitalism in New York’s public spaces. But on Tuesday, I left downtown Manhattan shell-shocked.

It began on Monday night, when the NYPD, aided by the FBI, raided the homes of prominent activists in New York. Following these preemptive, unwarranted visits — during which activists were questioned about May Day plans –  the police presence throughout Manhattan on May 1 was incomparable to anything I’ve seen in my three short years in the city. Friends, whose time in New York and its radical subcultures far predate mine, agreed; they’d never seen anything quite like it.

Notably, the unpermitted “Wildcat March,” called by New York anarchists and anti-authoritarians, was surrounded by hundreds of police before the 300-strong crowd could even leave its rallying point at Sarah D. Roosevelt park. Barely reaching the sidewalk from the park’s steps, a line of cops stormed into the march’s front banner, snatching and grabbing three participants. I joined a running splinter group as the crowd was chaotically dispersed into smaller marches; we then proceeded, almost one cop to every striker, as we made our slow way to regroup at Washington Square Park.

I didn’t head to the Union Square rally to join crowds swelling to over 10,000; I missed the hundreds of guitarists marching alongside Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello in a “guitarmy”; I missed musical performances, free food and free lectures from prominent thinkers like Francis Fox Piven and David Graeber. Instead I wandered around Manhattan in shock and awe with a handful of co-strikers, counting as I passed every block: at least four cops per corner. The buzz of a police helicopter overhead continued all day; I couldn’t count the number of police vehicles.

Writing for In These Times, Rebecca Burns points out that the police have changed their tactics since the early days of Occupy. Although on May 1 Oakland police once again deployed tear gas, we did not see the mass arrests or large crowd kettles typical of police responses in previous months. Burns notes: “Unlike the now-familiar Occupy scene of demonstrators being arrested en masse in dramatic, late-night evictions, May Day protesters in many locales were arrested individually throughout the day, in some cases for crossing over onto sidewalks or, according to local media on the scene in Oakland, seemingly at random.” There were only a reported 97 arrests in New York relating to May Day activity.

Snatch-and-grab police tactics intimidate crowds, but do not lead to the sort of dramatic mass arrest scenes that capture national headlines; it’s a more insidious form of crowd control. It is worth adding, however, that there was no shortage of police aggression: At one point I saw firsthand as a marcher was grabbed by police in the Lower East Side, his face slammed to the street. When pulled up and taken away, officers covered his face with his T-shirt so onlookers could not see the blood.

Then, after the mass evening march in New York had finished and no more than a thousand people had moved to the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial park at Manhattan’s southerly tip, the NYPD once again covered the area. Some remaining hundreds of the May Day participants had gathered for a mass general assembly; others milled around, sharing stories about the day or dancing to the ever-present drumbeats. The police encircled the small concrete park in time to disperse the relaxed crowd at 10 p.m., when the park closes. Clad in riot gear, the number of officers kept growing; hundreds and hundreds on foot and in vans surrounded the memorial park and every office building, street and corner. The NYPD is a standing army of around 35,000, and on the evening of May 1, New York felt like a city under military siege — it was terrifying.

Those of us who have been inspired by Occupy over the past year, those who see the importance of reclaiming and repurposing space (for public use that is not commerce), and who see the necessity of manifesting in the streets, are not fizzling or losing momentum. We are, however, being trampled, pushed, threatened and dispersed at every turn by well-armed, militarized police forces who once again made clear: We are not allowed to assemble on our own terms in this country.

But the NYPD’s “covertly follow every single Muslim in the tri-state area” approach to counter-terrorism has its defenders. Like Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who believes Americans Muslims have the right to worship wherever they see fit so long as they don’t pay any attention to the unmarked vans parked across the street.

And the department argues that it is allowed to carry out surveillance wherever it chooses, because there’s no law against just going around looking at things and taking some pictures, right? No, of course not, unless you look sort of Middle Eastern.

The NYPD earlier this week announced that they had totally caught some people who were almost definitely probably Iranian spies. These spies were caught red-handed spying all over the place!

Authorities have interviewed at least 13 people since 2005 with ties to Iran’s government who were seen taking pictures of New York City landmarks, a senior New York Police Department official said Wednesday.

The NYPD’s Mitchell Silber told Congress that Hezbollah and Iran definitely want to blow up New York, and the proof is three incidents of people “associated with the Iranian government” getting caught photographing things, in New York. (I am not much of a terrorist, but if you want pictures of New York City landmarks in order to figure out how best to blow them up why not try Flickr? There are hundreds of thousands of photos of every landmark in the city already online!)

While other so-called intelligence experts say ” there are no known or specific threats indicating Iranian plans to attack inside the U.S.,” Long Island-based Islamaphobe Republican Congressman Peter King and documented supporter of terrorism wants us all to be on high alert, because Hezbollah is everywhere:

Opening the hearing, King said, “We have a duty to prepare for the worst,” warning there may be hundreds of Hezbollah operatives in the United States, including 84 Iranian diplomats at the United Nations and in Washington who, “it must be presumed, are intelligence officers.”

Stop telling the NYPD not to spy on all the Muslims, everywhere! If they don’t keep tabs on all of them, the Iranians will get us!