Samantha Rosenbaum sues NYPD over frisking in Williamsburg

A college student is suing the NYPD claiming that police officers unnecessarily stopped on the street and searched her, including looking inside her underwear.

Samantha Rosenbaum, 22,  from Essex County, NJ, claims that she was stopped for no apparent reason last year as she stopped to stroke a cat in Williamsburg.

She made the allegations in a Brooklyn federal court lawsuit filed this week concerning the July 17 incident.

Ms Rosenbaum was on her way back from a post office errand during an internship she stooped down and looked a cat, reported the New York Post.

The suit claims that is when a man inside a gold sedan shouted at her to stop.

The Bard College graduate ignored the man, until he and another woman jumped out the car, demanding to know why she had not stopped and whether she had drugs, the suit alleges.

She told the newspaper that only after a few minutes the people told her they were police .

'My face and stomach were on the hood.'

She said that she offered to show them the cat, but the suit alleges the female cop the opened Ms Rosenbaum’s clothing and peering inside her bra and her under pants.

Ms Rosenbaum said she spent the whole ordeal sobbing - the suit says she was told multiple times she could be taken to the police station and written up for a felony.

She said she was let go after they told her they did not want her to a have a ' bad impression of cops.'

'This is a very nice young lady,' said her lawyer to the website. 'This was a false arrest and imprisonment. It’s assault.'

City Law Department spokeswoman Kate O’Brien Ahlers said, 'The city will evaluate the claim.'

Last week New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg took to the air to respond to a growing number of critics of his stop and frisk policing program.

He offered no apologies, but instead told his listeners that the NYPD has not done enough in the way of stopping minorities.

‘It’s society’s job to make sure that no one group is disproportionately represented as potential perpetrators,’ Bloomberg told radio host John Gambling on New York City’s WOR.

‘I think we disproportionately stop whites too much and minorities too little.’

‘Most crimes in our city – serious crimes – are committed by male, minorities 15 -25,’ said Bloomberg. 

‘When it comes to policing, the police have to be able to go out and stop, look for, those that fit the description of a witness or a victim after a crime.’

He declared that if New York City’s police officers were unable to accomplish that, they would effectively be turning ‘over the streets to the criminals.’

In recent weeks a growing chorus of critics has challenged Bloomberg's approach to fighting crime, pushing back against policies that he credits for making New York the safest major city in America.