Gov. David Paterson says he's been stopped several times by police on Long Island.
“In my own life, I was stopped three times,” Paterson said, while he was discussing the New York City Police Department’s controversial stop-and-frisk policy on Steve Harvey's radio show on WBLS 107.5 AM.
Last month, Paterson signed a law banning the NYPD from storing information on innocent people who have been stopped by police. Many of these drivers are black or Hispanic, according to The New York Post.
“One time, the officers talked to me for a couple of minutes and that was the end of that, and I thought they were very gracious to me,” said Paterson of his past brushes with law enforcement. “But two times, I’ll tell you, I hadn’t done anything wrong, but I sure felt like I had when they left.”
The incidents took place when the governor was in his teens and once in his late twenties, according to the Post. Morgan Hook, Paterson’s spokesperson, did not specify in what towns the stops happened in, but he did note that Paterson was never frisked.
“People in general, when the police stop them it is not a happy time,” the governor said on the radio.
