Racial profiling
Being stopped, searched or arrested because of your race violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and you can sue for it under Section 1983. It is a different claim from an unlawful stop. The Fourth Amendment asks whether the officer had grounds. Equal protection asks why the officer chose you, and it requires proof of both a discriminatory effect and a discriminatory purpose. That proof is the whole case.
Yes, this is a claim, and it is a harder one than most people expect. The Constitution forbids police from choosing whom to stop, search or arrest on the basis of race. But the claim does not live where people look for it. A court deciding whether a stop was lawful under the Fourth Amendment does not ask about the officer's motive at all. The motive question belongs to the Equal Protection Clause, and it comes with its own elements.
So a profiling case is usually two cases side by side: a Fourth Amendment claim about whether there were grounds for the stop, and an equal protection claim about why you were the one stopped. Either can succeed without the other.
How it happens
- The pretext stop. An officer follows a car until the driver commits a minor traffic violation, then uses the stop to question the occupants and ask to search. The violation is real. The reason the officer was following is not written down.
- The description that fits everyone. Officers stop men of one race in a neighborhood on a description that gives little more than race, sex and an age range.
- The stop with no stated reason. A person is stopped on the sidewalk and frisked. The form filled out later records a generic reason such as a furtive movement or a high-crime area.
- Different treatment at the same scene. In a mixed group doing the same thing, officers question, search or arrest only the people of one race and wave the others on.
- Words at the scene. The officer uses a slur or makes a remark about where the person belongs. It is often the most direct evidence of purpose a case will have.
- The unit's pattern. A unit's stops, taken together, fall on one group far out of proportion to anything that explains it, and supervisors who see the numbers do nothing.
The claim
The starting point is Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806 (1996). The Supreme Court held that an officer's subjective motive is irrelevant to the Fourth Amendment if probable cause exists. A traffic stop supported by a real violation is not made unreasonable by the officer's reason for choosing that car. In the same decision the Court said where the objection goes instead: discriminatory enforcement of the law is challenged under the Equal Protection Clause.
The elements come from United States v. Armstrong, 517 U.S. 456 (1996). A person claiming selective prosecution must show a discriminatory effect and a discriminatory purpose. The Second Circuit frames selective enforcement the same way: selective treatment compared with others similarly situated, motivated by an impermissible consideration such as race or religion, an intent to punish the exercise of constitutional rights, or a bad-faith intent to injure (LeClair v. Saunders, 627 F.2d 606 (2d Cir. 1980); Brown v. City of Oneonta, 221 F.3d 329 (2d Cir. 2000)).
In practice the proof is of two kinds. The first is direct: what the officer said, what the radio run said, what the paperwork gives as the reason. The second is comparative: who else was there, what they were doing, and what happened to them. A case with neither is a case about the stop, not about profiling, and it is brought under the Fourth Amendment.
The Fourth Amendment claim beside it
Officers may briefly stop a person only on reasonable suspicion of criminal activity, and may frisk outer clothing only with a reasonable belief the person is armed and dangerous (Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968)). A traffic stop may not be prolonged beyond the time needed for its mission without independent reasonable suspicion (Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348 (2015)). Reasonable suspicion is judged on the totality of the circumstances (District of Columbia v. R.W., No. 25-248 (U.S. Apr. 20, 2026) (per curiam)). See stop and frisk and unlawful search.
Floyd, and what the monitor reports
In Floyd v. City of New York, 959 F. Supp. 2d 540 (S.D.N.Y. 2013), after a bench trial, the court held the City liable under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments for deliberate indifference to widespread suspicionless stops and for indirect racial profiling, and appointed a monitor. That was a liability ruling after trial. The monitor still reports. According to press coverage of the monitor's August 2026 report on 2025 (Queens Daily Eagle, Aug. 20, 2026), the monitor found that stops by NYPD specialized units were lawful in about 83 percent of stops, 69 percent of frisks and 62 percent of searches, and that the figures for regular patrol were about 94, 83 and 79 percent. Those are the monitor's figures as reported, not ours, and we have not read the report itself.
The New York bias statute
New York also has a civil action for bias-related violence or intimidation based on actual or perceived race, color, national origin, ancestry, gender, religion, religious practice, age, disability or sexual orientation (N.Y. Civ. Rights Law § 79-n). It provides injunctive relief, damages and discretionary attorney's fees, and allows the Attorney General to seek a civil penalty of up to $5,000. Whether it fits a given police encounter depends on the facts; it covers violence or intimidation, not every unequal stop. In New Jersey, the Civil Rights Act gives a claim for deprivation of equal protection rights by a person acting under color of law (N.J.S.A. 10:6-2(c)).
What they will argue
There was a lawful basis for the stop
This is the first defense and, after Whren, it answers only the Fourth Amendment claim. It does not answer the equal protection claim, but it shapes the evidence: the defense will say the traffic violation or the description explains the stop completely, and that race played no part.
No one similarly situated
The defense will say you cannot identify people of another race, in the same place, doing the same thing, who were treated differently. This is where most profiling claims are lost. Body camera footage of the whole scene, not only of you, is what answers it, which is why the preservation request goes out in the first week. See evidence and body cameras.
Statistics are not purpose
A disparity in a department's numbers shows effect. The defense will say it does not show what this officer intended on this day. Numbers matter most for the claim against the city.
Qualified immunity and Monell
The officer will claim qualified immunity: that no clearly established law put a reasonable officer on notice that this conduct was unlawful (Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800 (1982)). The city will say that it answers only for its own policy or custom, not for one officer's choice (Monell v. Dep't of Social Servs., 436 U.S. 658 (1978)), and that a failure to train claim requires deliberate indifference, ordinarily shown by a pattern of similar violations (City of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378 (1989); Connick v. Thompson, 563 U.S. 51 (2011)). Floyd is an example of a pattern proved at trial. For an NYPD stop, the City's own civil rights law removes qualified immunity as a defense to a search and seizure claim (N.Y.C. Admin. Code § 8-804); see the city law page.
Heck
If the stop led to a conviction that still stands, a damages claim that would imply the conviction is invalid is barred (Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994)). Note too that evidence found after an unlawful stop can sometimes be used in the criminal case, as where a valid warrant turns up (Utah v. Strieff, 579 U.S. 232 (2016)). That is a suppression rule. The stop can still be unlawful for civil purposes.
What people have recovered
No public figure is published here for an individual racial profiling claim. Our ledger of public recoveries has no verified settlement or verdict that was reported as a profiling case, and our record of Floyd is a liability ruling and a monitor, with no payment figure. We do not print an amount we cannot source. The public settlements page lists the matters we have verified, by state, with their sources.
Those are other people's cases. What a case is worth depends on the injury, the evidence and the defenses; see what a case is worth. Where the stop involved no physical injury, remember that in the Second Circuit loss of liberty is compensable on its own (Kerman v. City of New York, 374 F.3d 93 (2d Cir. 2004)).
The clock
The equal protection claim and the Fourth Amendment claim are both Section 1983 claims and borrow the same state period. State notice rules do not apply to them (Felder v. Casey, 487 U.S. 131 (1988)), but they do apply to the state-law claims that name the city or county directly.
| State | Federal Section 1983 claim | State-law claim against a public employer | Authority |
|---|---|---|---|
| New York | Three years | Notice of claim within 90 days; suit within one year and 90 days | Owens v. Okure, 488 U.S. 235 (1989); N.Y. CPLR 214(5); N.Y. Gen. Mun. Law §§ 50-e(1)(a), 50-i(1) |
| New Jersey | Two years, also for the Civil Rights Act claim | Tort Claims Act notice within 90 days; six-month wait; barred after two years. No notice for a Civil Rights Act claim | N.J.S.A. 2A:14-2; 10:6-2; 59:8-8; Owens v. Feigin, 194 N.J. 607 (2008) |
| Florida | Four years | Written claim to the agency within three years; six-month wait; suit within four years | Fla. Stat. §§ 95.11(3), 768.28(6), (14) |
| Pennsylvania | Two years | Written notice to the government unit within six months | 42 Pa.C.S. §§ 5524, 5522(a); Kach v. Hose, 589 F.3d 626 (3d Cir. 2009) |
A conspiracy among officers to deny equal protection is separately actionable, and a claim against someone who knew of the conspiracy and failed to prevent it carries a one-year limit (42 U.S.C. §§ 1985(3), 1986). The New York, New Jersey, Florida and Pennsylvania pages go through each state.
If the stop ended in an arrest and the charge is still open, talk to your defense lawyer before you describe the arrest to anyone. The criminal case and civil case page explains why.
Stop and frisk
What an officer needs for the stop, and what more is needed for the frisk.
Stop and frisk →Car and phone searches
When a traffic stop turns into a search of the car or the phone, and what the law requires.
Car and phone searches →Supervisors who let it happen
When the pattern was visible to the people in charge, and what must be shown against them.
Supervisor liability →Common questions
The officer had a legal reason to pull me over. Can it still be profiling?
Yes. Under Whren v. United States an officer's motive does not matter to the Fourth Amendment if there was probable cause, so the stop itself may be lawful. But the Court said in the same decision that discriminatory enforcement is challenged under the Equal Protection Clause. A stop can be valid under one amendment and unconstitutional under the other.
What do I have to prove?
A discriminatory effect and a discriminatory purpose. In the Second Circuit that is usually framed as selective treatment compared with others similarly situated, motivated by an impermissible consideration such as race or religion. Proof comes from the officer's words, the pattern of the officer's stops, department data, and what happened to other people in the same place doing the same thing.
Did the Floyd case end stop and frisk in New York?
No. In Floyd v. City of New York a federal judge found the City liable after a bench trial in 2013 for widespread suspicionless stops and indirect racial profiling, and appointed a monitor. The monitor still reports. The ruling was about the City's practices as a whole. An individual who was stopped still brings his or her own claim, on his or her own facts.
How long do I have?
For the federal claim, three years in New York, two in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and four in Florida. State-law claims against a city or county carry notice rules as short as 90 days. The deadline tool goes through each.
Tell us what happened.
One conversation with an attorney, in your language. We tell you which claims the facts support, which deadline runs first for the agency involved, what evidence to preserve this week, and whether a pending criminal case changes the timing. If it is not a case we can take, we say so and tell you where to go.
(718) 484-7510If a criminal charge is still open, talk to your defense lawyer before you describe the arrest to anyone, including us. English, Russian and Spanish in-house; an interpreter for any other language. Contingency fee, confirmed in writing before we begin.