NYPD Subway Police
(Photo : flickr/Ludovic Bertron)

A Latina vendor arrested and humiliated in New York sparked public outcry as police intensified operations aimed to reduce subway crimes.

According to Remezcla, a video showing cops putting handcuffs on a churro vendor in the New York City subway has gone viral. The Latina vendor arrested in the video, claims she could not understand what the police were saying, but they did not believe her. Instead, they pulled her food cart and led her out of the subway station. The report added that she was given two options: pay a fine or get arrested. 

Public outcry stems from what others consider as over-policing. This incident is not confined to just New York alone. A similar incident happened when cops pointed a gun at a black man for failing to pay the required fare. Others believe, the Latino and black communities are targeted with these arrests and consider most of them to be purely harassment.

Per HipLatina, the NYPD stated that it was a matter of law as it is prohibited to participate in the unlicensed sale of food in the subway station. What's more, the NYPD statement claims that the woman was summoned and not arrested, and that she was released soon there after. Elsa, the name of the arrested vendor, says that the officer laughed after taking her to an area where there is no camera.

New York has rules and regulations regarding selling of food and products in subway stations, but people cannot help but think the motivation for these arrests tell a different story. Elsa is not the only vendor who was handcuffed. In Myrtle-Wyckoff station, another churro vendor got arrested, the Gothamist reports. The police are saying they already asked the woman to leave as she is unauthorized to sell her goods, but she returned to the station later that day.

Governor Andrew Cuomo has set up a plan to curb people from not paying the required fares. That plan includes adding 500 more cops to subways.

It has been revealed that women undergo an extremely hard time selling goods and products on the streets and in subways.  Fifty women vendors were polled and roughly 38 percent confessed that they had a stressful interaction with the authorities. 

There are others who support the police. Some say that a law, is a lam, and that it should be implemented. While vendors could get away with it in the past, it is much different now. The crackdown on illegal vendors comes with a high price tag and the taxpayers are shouldering it. Eater explains that the cost of training the cops and its operation is 249 million dollars, while potential savings from those who evade fare is only 200 million dollars. It does not require a genius to see that the deployment and operations of police costs the tax payer quite a bit more. However, the 200 million dollars lost to the turnstile jumpers is primarily used for the salaries of legal subway workers, as well as maintenance and up keep of one of the world's busiest public transit systems.

Street Vendor Project director Matthew Shapiro offers a simple solution: Focus on the more important matters and leave the vendors alone. "Let's talk about all the other things that are against the law and why you're not doing anything about that," he stated in an interview.