NEW YORK — Many of the 5 million New Yorkers stopped, questioned, and sometimes frisked by police in the past decade were wrongly targeted because of their race, said lawyers Monday for four men who contend they were illegally stopped.

New York Police Department lawyers countered that officers must go where the crime is — and the crime is overwhelmingly in minority neighborhoods.

A civil trial that began Monday in federal court in Manhattan will examine the controversial tactic that has become a city flashpoint, with mass demonstrations, City Council hearings, and mayoral candidates calling for reform.