The headline and article are trying really hard to emphasize the mask angle of the story.

He was walking down Spindle Road, a residential street of tidy lawns and single-family homes in Hicksville, wearing dark clothes and a ski mask in August, the county police said in a statement.

… Mr. Castillo “was on the street corner, and somebody called in a suspicious person.”

When police officers arrived, they frisked Mr. Castillo and discovered a 14-inch knife in the waistband of his pants, the department said in a statement on Tuesday.

I expect he would have been stopped, searched, arrested, and charged the same regardless of any mask law.