Casting a net too wide

Kudos to New York Gov. David Paterson, who signed a measure Friday that will clear out a database that held the names of thousands of people who had been stopped and frisked by police in New York City but were not charged with a crime. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly lobbied Paterson to reject the legislation, with Kelly calling it a “great crime-fighting tool.” But I think Paterson had it right when he said the so-called “stop-and-frisk” system was “not a policy for democracy.” There’s just way too much opportunity for official mischief. Don Lieberman of the New York Civil Liberties Union expressed the concern well by saying, “Innocent people stopped by police for doing nothing more than going to school, work or the subway should not become permanent criminal suspects.”