Hi, I'm Seyi Rhodes. I'm 28 years old, I'm a Black male.
I've never been stopped an searched in my life.
Everyone tells me I should be getting lots of hassle from the police.
I'm going to sort this out by giving myself 5 days to get stopped and searched.
This is Stop and Search Me.
Black Londoners are eight times more likely to get frisked than white ones.
When the police did a survey on their stop and search policy,
55% of Black people said it was racist.
So I should be finding this real easy, but I wasn't.
I tried to find out what I needed to do.
Maybe you don't fit into the box of stereotypical views of young black kids.
The main thing I would say is your appearance ...
you don't look like the type that would
carry a gun, or a knife, or drugs. - Really?
Well, they weren't very helpful.
I tried to hanging around in all the places I'd seen Black people getting searched before.
My cameraman Frank followed at a safe distance, but nothing happened.
I'm starting to wonder if this sort of thing actually goes on.
The next day, me and Frank went out in the evening,
we'd heard the police only harass people at night.
We were right. The police were everywhere.
On foot. In cars. In vans. On bikes.
Really, bikes.
It was all a bit scary.
I needed to find some people with experience who could help me.
These look like the chaps for the job.
When was the last time say, you got stopped and searched?
I got stopped two nights ago. CID rolled on me.
Didn't ask me any questions. Just threw me into the bushes.
They seen me and I've been told that I've an identity crisis by the police
because I'm rolling with Black people.
I've got hay fever, so I carry a lot of tissue with me.
They're dashing the tissue on the floor, I'm saying like,
'What you doing, I've got hay fever, I need that!'
They saying,'When we've finished, you can pick it up', like I'm an animal.
I had two score things of weed, I ballsed one luckily, they never got that,
and they got the other one which was in my pocket.
I've decided it's time to do something about that.
I've given myself five days to try and get stopped and searched.
- Well you need to lower them trousers .. - No, they're low enough man
- Bit lower, bit lower - Pull your hood up
- Yeah, get a hoodie - Little bandanna, round your face
Yeah, you should get stopped then.
Yeah, that's what you need - a banny ... - Where's the hotspots?
- Right here! Right here! - Look for the cycle squad.
Roll a zoot on the road and stand here with some weed.
Today was a good day, met some really nice boys,
they took me out, showed me around,
showed me what to wear, where to hang out, that kind of thing.
I was surprised they still get stopped and searched all the time though
bearing in mind they know exactly what they're doing wrong.
Bit disappointed because after two hours of hanging round with them I got nothing.
We didn't even see any police.
I'm going to do what they told me tomorrow, and hopefully, get stopped and searched.
The next day I got hooded up and went out for the night.
I wandered the streets with my trousers falling half off my arse.
I loitered in unlikely places and generally tried to get noticed.
It was useless on my own.
I tried tagging along with a few groups of boys but that didn't help much either.
Then I saw this!
Real life stop and search, right in front of my very eyes.
If only I'd walked down the road a few minutes earlier, it could've been me!
It's about 8 o' clock at night on a Friday night and already as you can see,
bully vans going and we've got some angry residents ... try and speak to them?
It was all a bit too realistic for my cameraman Frank.
He chose this moment to walk out on me.
- Frank, what's going on man? - Don't BLEEPING film me man, turn it off!
- What's going on? You can't just leave me! - I'm going.
I don't want to get arrested, this is too much!
Frank!
On day four I had no cameraman, but luckily,
a friend of a friend's friend
put me in touch with some boys from an apparently notorious estate
near somewhere called 'Murder Mile'.
My tip-off was bang on.
There were police everywhere and the boys were starting to feel a bit intimidated.
- Tell me why you're standing here. - Tell the camera why you're standing here.
- 'Cos you're bored you said, yeah? - Yeah, it's 'cos I'm bored.
I'm getting paid to do this.
- So we've done nothing to you ... - Take the number of the badge, everything
- What am I trying? - You're just trying to cramp our space.
- If we walk over there, you're gonna walk over there? - Come walking ... are you gonna stand like that?
She's trying to make her claim and she's still standing there.
I tried to get the police to pay attention to me, but they weren't really interested.
My new friends got lots of attention though.
Is there any particular reason you're filming us?
Just as I thought we were about to get handcuffed, the police started talking to us.
A stop and search goes on if we've got grounds to stop and search people.
If I walk up to someone and I smell a strong smell of cannabis,
you're gonna get searched,
because I believe you're in possession of that,
although it being a Class C, it's an offence.
You know what it is, if there's one person getting stopped or something,
there'll be about five officers on one person,
that's mainly what gets people get pissed off.
I'm saying the majority.
And then why is that? For your safety?
If it can be justified, then obviously, it's not a problem there.
Five on one, if the guy's a big fellow and he's packing something,
yeah, there's gonna be five.
There's gonna be ten.
I've never been stopped and searched in my life. Why is that?
It's body language, a lot of body language.
I can walk around this estate today with you,
and I can see lads coming up on bikes
and as soon as they see me they'll do a U-turn and bugger off.
I've been stopped and searched by the police at a football match,
there was what was called a Section 16,
and I got searched by officers, and I welcomed it,
I knew it would help reduce disorder in the community and I had nothing to hide.
The policeman was very nice, but he refused to stop and search me, so I left.
The boys suggested we leave Hackney,
so the next day I convinced Frank to come back and work for one last night.
We decided to hire the most expensive car we could get hold of.
I reckon we'll definitely get stopped and searched in this,
but Frankie, there's one problem, I can't drive mate.
So, there you go. Nice one. Let's go.
Frank and I drove around for a while, it was pretty boring,
so we went back to Clapton to get the boys.
Things certainly livened up after that.
The boys were well up for getting stopped by the police.
We're out to get shipped.
We're out to get nicked, nicked!
Where you coppers?
We drove around, music pumping for hours.
We tried overtaking police cars but nothing happened.
In fact, they were more friendly than anything else.
Now and then, we'd pull over to the side of the road and dance around the car.
The police just drove past us.
You got nothing better to do?
The boys resorted to taunting the police.
Allo, 'allo, 'allo?
Eventually they took the bait.
Are you all right mate?
This was it. My big moment.
Five Black guys in a Merc, surely he's going to search us?
- I said how's it going ...? - You got your seat belt on?
- Uh? - Do you want to put your seat belt on?
- Yeah, I will do, no problem. - Good man.
- You got your seat belt on as well? - I certainly have, sir.
... and that was it.
I hadn't managed got stopped and searched, so the next day I went to find my new friends
to see if they could explain what had gone wrong.
I reckon you never got stopped because you were looking out for them.
When you looking out for them, you won't get stopped.
You try and act like you're not doing nothing wrong usually.
You try and act normal, that's when they're thinking 'allo, 'allo.
It's not just about being Black either.
I get stopped same amount of times as other people get stopped.
You have to be doing your own thing, that's when they're coming to you,
or if you're doing a crime.