OVER OR UNDER THE TURNSTILES ..... COPS CAN'T TARGET ONLY YOUNG BLACK MEN IN CASUAL CLOTHES

The MTA has a fare-dodging point. But why make it so dumbly? 

 

By Nicole Gelinas

 

 

New York Post 

June 2, 2022

 

 

The MTA has been using an edited video of a woman ducking under the turnstile holding a coffee drink as an example of fare evaders 

 

As usual, the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority is its own worst enemy — using as evidence for the city’s current fare-evasion crisis a four-year-old video that shows a latte-cradling woman go through the motions of swiping a MetroCard and then ducking under the turnstile after she failed. But don’t let bureaucratic idiocy distract from the bigger issue: Too many people aren’t paying their fares.

To back up MTA chief Janno Lieber’s case last month that fare evasion is at a “tipping point,” proved by “countless images of people in designer clothes, carrying $7 lattes, waltzing through emergency gates at Wall Street or on the Upper East Side,” the MTA released a video of a lady in a nice coat ducking under the turnstile.

With “countless” images to choose from, this wasn’t the best one. The clip predates the pandemic by 18 months. (Clue: The woman isn’t wearing a mask.)

And, as The Post has found, the fugitive woman in question tries to swipe her MetroCard before crouching under, a prelude the MTA conveniently left out.

It’s yet another reminder: What’s in a few seconds of video is almost never the full story.

And yet the stubborn fact remains: New York does have a fare-evasion problem as well as a violent-crime crisis on the subway, and the two are not unrelated.

Barely more than a week ago, just after the murder of Daniel Enriquez on the Q train, a different suspect boarded a 6 train on the Upper East Side, wielded a knife and threatened to behead a straphanger.

How did the suspect get on the train? He jumped over the turnstile. If the cops had caught him jumping the fare and detained him, they could have arrested him for bringing a weapon into the subway and prevented the armed threat.

 

Andrew Abdullah, who allegedly shot Goldman Sachs worker Daniel Enriquez on the Q train, got onto the subway after jumping over a turnstile

 

Indeed, the cops did stop a turnstile-jumper last month in Coney Island and took a loaded gun off him.

The MTA’s failure to find current footage aside, there is no dispute that a lot of people are beating the fare. The MTA puts the figure at 12.5%, more than three times the pre-COVID level.

One-third of bus riders are boarding without paying — a figure borne out by my two bus trips up and down the spine of the south to mid-Bronx and back two weeks ago.

As the NYPD steps up fare enforcement, though, officers have to be, well, fair. They can’t target only young minority men in casual clothes, as these two suspects were, and assume that a well-dressed white woman swiping and then ducking means well, as a respectable white lady would never purposely beat the fare.

 

In 1990 William “Bill” Bratton took his first ride as new transit Police Chief, with John Aylward, Pres. of the transit Police Union. Bratton dragnetted every fare dodger — insurance salesmen, artists, messengers, college students and even grandmothers

 

 

Maybe this latte-loving lady of the Before Times in the MTA’s little 2018 Zapruder film paid her fare, and it failed to register. Maybe she had no money on her MetroCard or it had expired. Maybe she was in a hurry and didn’t want to stop to refill her card.

Or maybe she steals the fare every day, and pretending to swipe is her cover –— whereas maybe the black kid in sweatpants pays the fare every day but lost his wallet.

The point is, we can’t make these judgments based on appearance or attempts. If the turnstile doesn’t move, it doesn’t move. By all means, if you think you’ve paid your fare, it’s hardly the crime of the century to take your chances and duck under, but know that there could be a consequence, a $100 fine.

Give people excuses for farebeating, and everybody is going to have an excuse. I forgot my MetroCard. My credit card isn’t working. I couldn’t miss my train so I had to run through the gate.

They don’t put up with these excuses in Paris or London, where a ticket inserted into a machine the wrong way or a credit card that doesn’t tap right won’t win you any sympathy.

In the early 1990s, when transit-police chief Bill Bratton cracked down on fare evasion, the marketing genius of his sweeps was that he dragnetted everyone — “insurance salesmen, artists, messengers, college students and een grandmothers.”

One white-collar worker pleaded that he had forgotten his wallet — and said he felt “ashamed and embarrassed” to be caught sneaking in. The natural impulse is to say let him go. But then you’ve got to let everyone go. It’s not quite clear that New York is ready for the honor system.