CHICAGO — The New York Post website's top headline screamed "Welcome to Chicago" Tuesday morning after some New York police complained that a judge's order halting the police department's "stop-and-frisk" tactic will make the Big Apple more dangerous.
The end of stop-and-frisk, which allowed police to pat down and search people on the street, will send crime "soaring to levels found in blighted cities like Chicago and Detroit," New York cops told the Post.
"Welcome to Chicago," one officer told the paper.
The Chicago Police Department fired back Tuesday afternoon, pointing to the incorrect assertion that crime is "soaring" here.
"In Chicago, we've had significantly less crime, significantly fewer shootings and fewer murders of any year since 1965," Chicago Police Department spokesman Adam Collins said. "And we've done that without imposing on the rights of residents."
Chicago's top cop, Supt. Garry McCarthy, also touted Chicago's crime reduction.
"As you know, we have a 1965 murder rate in the City of Chicago right now and I think there are some unwarranted perceptions that exist out there," said McCarthy, a former New York cop who was brought to Chicago by Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
"We have had a historical problem with violence in this city. We still have a problem with violence in this city as does New York City as does any other urban center in this country," McCarthy said at an unrelated news conference Tuesday.
McCarthy used the opportunity to pound away at an issues he's been pushing — the need for stronger sentences for gun offenders in Illinois.
"Fact is we're making great progress and what's different about Chicago isn't about stop and frisk. What's different about Chicago is guns. The gun laws in New York City, they have a three year mandatory minimum for illegal possession of a firearm," he said. "... The system here is not structured to support the efforts that we're doing here."
The stop-and-frisk ruling came down Monday, with a judge saying that the NYPD violated thousands of New Yorkers' constitutional rights by stopping and searching more than 4 million people they suspected of wrongdoing.
DNAinfo New York reports that the majority of those stopped and searched by New York police were black and Hispanic men — 88 percent of whom were released without any charges.
"The city adopted a policy of indirect racial profiling by targeting racially defined groups for stops based on local crime suspect data," Manhattan federal Judge Shira Scheindlin wrote in a 198-page ruling on the case.
Meanwhile, former New York Gov. George Pataki also lashed out at Chicago over the ruling, saying "If [Attorney General] Eric Holder and [President] Barack Obama want to investigate a police department, why don't they look at Chicago, where the civil rights of young African Americans are being not only taken away, but they're being murdered in record rates in the South Side of Chicago."
Obama and Holder were not involved in the lawsuit challenging New York's policy, but the Justice Department had said that if the policy was found unconstitutional, an independent monitor should be appointed, according to Politico.
Appearing on MSNBC Tuesday morning, Pataki charged that Chicago ignores its minority and low-income residents. "It's easy to not pay attention to the housing projects like they do in Chicago and let crime go on there," he said.
Collins said the biggest difference between Chicago and New York when it comes to crime is Chicago's gun laws.
"New York has far tougher gun laws and mandatory minimum [sentences] for gun possession," Collins said. "That isn't the case here."
