The Wall

While living in NYC I can't even recall how many times I was stopped by police officers and frisked.  I always looked like a "drug dealer" or, at one point, a "bank robber."  The one and only time I was mugged in NYC was by a cop.  Or so he said.  No, he wasn't in uniform, nor did he jump out of a marked car.  But I believed him because I had been stopped by plain clothes cops before.  In Jersey City, a plain clothes cop ran at me with his gun drawn.  That was the one time I "looked like a bank robber."  Well, I just read an article on Facebook about New York's current Stop & Frisk law.  If the NYPD feel probable cause to stop and frisk a citizen, they can do so.  Back in the '90s, they were stopping and frisking with "probable" cause, too.  That's when I encountered all my incidents.

I could fill volumes and volumes of books with what  I don't know.  But what I know for sure is that my gender and the color of my skin were all the "probable cause" the NYPD needed to stop and frisk me.  Yes, in the beginning it was humiliating.  By the 10th time or so, it became as natural as having someone ask me for the time.  It is now 2012 and nothing much has changed.  Well, actually, something has changed.  Because now, it appears that when one is stopped and frisked, if he asks any too many questions, he'll be Stopped, Frisked, Beaten & Arrested.  When I talk to God tonight, I'm gonna be sure to ask, "When will unkindness end?"  I hope and pray He answers me.