Minority Fare Evaders Are Arrested Most At This Brooklyn Station

DOWNTOWN, BROOKLYN — All but one fare evader arrested at Jay Street and Borough Hall over three months was a person of color, making it the top station where minorities faced arrests in the city, advocates said this week.

Crime data released by the NYPD for April through the end of June shows that of the 27 people that were arrested for not paying the subway fare at Jay Street and Borough Hall, which are connected, 22 were black and four were Hispanic. Only one of the fare evaders arrested was white, data shows.

That means that the station saw more fare evasion arrests than any other station in the city during that time period.

And, because of the breakdown by race, the most arrests of people of color, according to an analysis by the Legal Aid Society.

But the disproportionate arrest numbers are far from an isolated incident, the advocates said. Their analysis found that white offenders only counted for 76 of the 682 fare evasion arrests citywide.

"Despite pledges by Mayor Bill de Blasio and New York City Police Department Commissioner James O'Neill to curb racial enforcement, the NYPD, as it does with so many offenses, continues to disproportionately target communities of color for what is basically a crime of poverty," said Anthony Posada, supervising attorney of the Community Justice Unit at The Legal Aid Society.

The Legal Aid Society and other advocates have long contended that the city's attempts to crackdown on fare evasion have disproportionately harmed minorities and low-income New Yorkers.

In June, when Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that 500 officers would be stationed at 100 fare evasion "hotspots," the group said the focus should be on programs that offer discounted fares to poor communities rather than a crackdown.

Officials said at the time that the team of officers would focus on issuing summonses, rather than arresting fare evaders. The effort is aimed to reduce an increase in people skipping the subway fare this year, which Cuomo said is not only illegal, but unfair to all riders.

The MTA has estimated that roughly one in five bus riders don't pay the fare. The agency has lost $243 million in the yearlong period ending in March 2019, up from $225 million in the 2018 calendar year, officials said at the time.

Posada said that fare evasion arrests can affect employment, deny access to public benefits and result in detention or deportation for immigrants.

"It has been abundantly clear for years now that the NYPD is incapable of curtailing its disparate enforcement and we urge the City to cease criminalizing poverty because the human cost is too high," he said.

Along with Jay Street and Borough Hall, seven Brooklyn stations landed on the top 10 list for the most fare evasion arrests between April and June.

Sutter Avenue station took the second spot with a total of 17 arrests — 16 people of color and one white person. Nostrand Avenue, Nevins Street, Hoyt-Schermerhorn, 53rd Street and Stillwell Avenue-Coney Island also saw some of the most arrests in the city.