The League of Iowa Human & Civil Rights Agencies

They were 11 black and Hispanic high school students on a college trip to Howard University, and they could not have asked for more — cool 16-person minibus with DVD player, great campus visit, magical tour of Washington at night. Organized by a youth social service organization, Safe Space NYC, the trip was envisioned as a lesson in the grand possibilities beyond Jamaica, Queens. But as he stepped haltingly backward off the bus, hands clasped behind his head as police rifles bristled, Kyron de la Rosa, 16, kept thinking about very different possibilities. “I kept thinking, ‘I really hope I don’t trip and fall because that could be the end of my life,’ ” he said. “I watch all the police shows — ‘America’s Most Wanted,’ ‘Cops,’ ‘World’s Dumbest Criminals’ — so I’ve seen things just like this on television, and I’m thinking: ‘Wow. I thought those kind of things only happened to criminals. What’s going on here?’ ”

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