How do you end racial profiling?

[horhay_achoa]

This might already be on the boards somewhere, but I couldn’t run a search. It’s messed up.

How do you end racial profiling by cops? People can analyze data about who is pulled over and who is arrested forever, but that will not eliminate the problem. You can’t really set quotas either, because then you’ll have guilty people getting away, and innocent people being arrested. The only way I can see to eliminate the problem is to hire cops who are not “pigs”, and who are educated enough to know that any race is equally capable of committing any crime. Does anyone know of any current policies that are being used to help bring this problem to an end? Any thoughts?

[Stuffy]

The only way I can see to eliminate the problem is to hire cops who are not “pigs”, and who are educated enough to know that any race is equally capable of committing any crime.

*emphasize mine *

Well first I wouldn’t use that phrase, it’ll cause defensiveness.

I’ve always been more inclined to think of Racial Profiling not as a sign of bigotry but lazy law enforcement. It’s just far easier to discover evidence of a crime during a routine search than by commiting officers to typically long term investigations as witnessed by the disparity in possesion vs. sales rates in drug crimes. A clear proble with this scenario is you’re not really effectively removing drugs from the street, as you didn’t get the supply side of the equation. (IANAL) But I seem to recall that after a certain weight, it’s no longer considered possesion but trafficking, please feel free to correct.

Secondly, I think a more detailed or clear definition of Racial Profiling is needed. While basing stops of motorist solely on skin color alone, to me, is a valid example of RP. Race can be used as a predictor/descriptor in legimate ways. For instance, if 5 women had their purses snatched near Bart* Stations, and they described their assailant as a 6’1" black man weighing approx 220lbs (my own description). Then certainly police should be focusing on 6’1" black men in the 200lb range, loitering around Bart stations.

*Bart (Bay Area Rapid Transit) an el/subway sytem.

[Kimstu]

Here’s the def of “racial profiling” from a current bill to enact national legislation against it (HR 2074 and S 989):

The term `racial profiling’ means the practice of a law enforcement agent relying, to any degree, on race, ethnicity, or national origin in selecting which individuals to subject to routine investigatory activities, or in deciding upon the scope and substance of law enforcement activity following the initial routine investigatory activity, except that racial profiling does not include reliance on such criteria in combination with other identifying factors when the law enforcement agent is seeking to apprehend a specific suspect whose race, ethnicity, or national origin is part of the description of the suspect.

Sounds about right to me; I think that “specific suspect” language should be adequate to allow for cases such as the BART purse-snatcher in your example.

What startled me in the text of that bill was how comparatively ineffective racial profiling actually is. To wit:

A 2001 Department of Justice report on citizen-police contacts in 1999 found that, although African-Americans and Hispanics were more likely to be stopped and searched, they were less likely to be in possession of contraband. On average, searches and seizures of African-American drivers yielded evidence only eight percent of the time, searches and seizures of Hispanic drivers yielded evidence only 10 percent of the time, and searches and seizures of white drivers yielded evidence 17 percent of the time.

For Pit’s sake, if it doesn’t even provide a real crime-control advantage, why did we ever even start doing it? Oh, that’s right, because we still have all these racist prejudices about nonwhites being the criminals.

[horhay_achoa]

stuffinb–I was thinking of racial profiling in the context of traffic stops. Having a description of someone who committed a crime, weather it is accurate or not, is clearly a reason for police to look for a person that matches that description.
You are correct…I don’t want to upset any officers by using a derogatory term…I apologize for that, but I do believe that officers guilty of RP do not deserve the respect that an upstanding policeman does.
Anyway, in terms of traffic stops and traffic stops leading to searches, is there anyway to end racial profiling? Perhaps some sort of system where officers are only allowed to make a certain number of failed searches before they are penalized in some way?? The problem I see with this is that it might lead to cops being scared to search out of fear of being punished.

[Stuffy]

Thanks Kimstu, I hadn’t heard of that bill.

For Pit’s sake, if it doesn’t even provide a real crime-control advantage, why did we ever even start doing it? Oh, that’s right, because we still have all these racist prejudices about nonwhites being the criminals.

IIRC the DEA started this during the height of the crack epidemic. In that instance a drug gang (yes members of this gang were black) out of NY were flying into FL and using rental cars to drive the drugs back stopping of at various places along the route I95. For some reason (maybe yours) it was then adapted a nationally, during DEA/local law enforcement training.
horhay_achoa I didn’t mean to imply you meant it any other way, but I’ve heard people who’ve derided the use of race in suspect descriptions.

[Turbo_Dog]

To start with, I don’t think that you can end RP. There will always be people assuming that they were stopped solely on their visual image. And in many cases they are correct.

The reason that most cops have a problem with the definition of RP (see Kimstu’s post) is because race is often used as a factor, but not simply because of the race. I’ve spoken about this with my Dad (a cop) and all the friends I have that are cops here in St. Louis, Vegas, L.A. and San Diego, all of various races. On basic patrol work, they all use race to a certain extent simply because in most cases it’s not “the norm” of the area they are in. For instance, if a cop is patrolling a predominately white neighborhood at night that he knows usually has no traffic, and a car with a black driver is driving around, they draw more attention. One of my dad’s favorite things is to go into the poorer black and native american neighborhoods look for white kids, especially in nicer cars. 7 out of 10 times, according to him, the ones that he pulls over have drugs, weapons, etc in the car. He calls them his “easy picking’s nights”. But under the definition of RP, he cannot do that anymore. The drill is simple for all of them. Find people that “don’t belong”, get behind them, watch their body language while they are driving and look for the nervous ones. Most patrol cops can easily find a reason to pull anyone over. My dad says that he can get behind anyone, and within 3 miles, find a legal reason to stop them. Even the slightest drift is a legal reason for suspicion of influence.

Does RP exist? By definition, absolutely. Does it exist for the reasons it’s portrayed? In many cases, yes. Does it exist to the extent that it is portrayed? No, I don’t believe it does and haven’t seen anything to convince me otherwise. In any event though, 50 years from now, there will still be complaints of RP from all races.

[Freedom]

For instance, if 5 women had their purses snatched near Bart* Stations, and they described their assailant as a 6’1" black man weighing approx 220lbs (my own description). Then certainly police should be focusing on 6’1" black men in the 200lb range, loitering around Bart stations.

Ahhhhh!!!

As a white male sitting here in my white neighborhood, I completely disagree with that thought. That is EXACTLY why we have racial profiling.

Just how many 6’1" 200 lb black men pass through Bart stations? I’m guessing THOUSANDS. Those thousands of men should not have to be harrassed just because they fit a thumb nail description that vague.

Racial profiling really pisses me off. I hate the thought that a person of color who moves into a predominately white neighborhood should have to worry about getting stopped while out walking or jogging. I hate that if there are three cars speeding on the highway, the cops look to see the race of the occupants before pulling them over.

I dismiss a lot of complaints that come from “black” organizations as pure crap, but I agree that the criminal justice system is racist and rotten to the core.

From traffic stops to the death penalty, justice is not blind in this country.

[C_K_Dexter_Haven]

Um, Freedom, so your point is that if the purse-snatcher were described as a “6’1” black man weighing approx 220lbs" that the cops should ALSO be stopping 5’ Caucasian females weighing approx 120 lbs?

One of the difficulties, frankly, in eliminating racial profiling is the relationship between race and economics. I live in a suburban upper-middle class neighborhood. Two cars drive along, one a shiny new Mercedes and the other a rusted, beat-up 1973 Ford with a cracked windshield and one fender tied on with rope. Which car gets stopped? The one that looks “out of place”, naturally and rightly. And which car is driven by a black person and which by a white person? Well, I didn’t say, but the sad reality is that a higher proportion of black people are in the lower economic strata. So, let’s say the police stop cars that don’t look like they belong to someone who lives on that street, and they are immediately accused of racial profiling, because they tend to be stopping way more blacks and Hispanics(proportionally) than whites.

Does this mean that people who LOOK upper-middle class have an easier chance of committing burglaries? Sure. But that’s not racial.

Next example: Two men walk into a building, one in an expensive suit, with an expensive briefcase, neat hair, shiny shoes; the other in a torn and dirty trench coat, torn sneakers with no socks, unshaved, and stinking of liquor. Who gets past the guards? Who gets stopped? And this one is independent of race.

Sure, it could turn out that the one in the expensive suit is a burglar, sneaking in to rob the place, and the one in the dirty trench coat is the owner of the building. But that’s not the likely scenario. The true con artist knows how to camoflauge him/herself.

We’ve had an enormous amount of trouble in our suburb over the accusation that the police do racial profiling. I suspect that’s not it at all – I suspect it’s economic profiling. But the sad fact is that blacks and whites (as groups) are not spread proportionally through all economic classes.