[Senate Hearing 106-996]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 106-996
RACIAL PROFILING WITHIN LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CONSTITUTION, FEDERALISM, AND PROPERTY RIGHTS
of the
COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
MARCH 30, 2000
__________
Serial No. J-106-74
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
72-780 WASHINGTON : 2001
COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah, Chairman
STROM THURMOND, South Carolina PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont
CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts
ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania JOSEPH R. BIDEN, Jr., Delaware
JON KYL, Arizona HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin
MIKE DeWINE, Ohio DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California
JOHN ASHCROFT, Missouri RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin
SPENCER ABRAHAM, Michigan ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey
JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York
BOB SMITH, New Hampshire
Manus Cooney, Chief Counsel and Staff Director
Bruce A. Cohen, Minority Chief Counsel
------
Subcommittee on the Constitution, Federalism, and Property Rights
JOHN ASHCROFT, Missouri, Chairman
ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin
BOB SMITH, New Hampshire EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts
ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont
STROM THURMOND, South Carolina
Paul Clement, Chief Counsel
Robert F. Schiff, Minority Chief Counsel
C O N T E N T S
----------
STATEMENTS OF COMMITTEE MEMBERS
Page
Ashcroft, Hon. John, a U.S. Senator from the State of Missouri... 1
Feingold, Hon. Russell D., a U.S. Senator from the State of
Wisconsin...................................................... 3
Kennedy, Hon. Edward M., a U.S. Senator from the State of
Massachusetts.................................................. 6
Torricelli, Hon. Robert G., a U.S. Senator from the State of New
Jersey......................................................... 54
WITNESSES
Conyers, Hon. John, Jr., a U.S. Representative from the State of
Michigan....................................................... 8
Gerald, Rossano, Master Sergeant, U.S. Army...................... 11
Harris, David, Balk Professor of Law and Values, University of
Toledo College of Law.......................................... 32
Hughes, Johnny L., National Troopers Coalition................... 41
Jones, Hon. Leroy J., Jr., State Assemblyman, State of New Jersey 55
Lautenberg, Hon. Frank, a U.S. Senator from the State of New
Jersey......................................................... 9
Rodriguez, Curtis V., Attorney, Member of the California State
Bar............................................................ 21
Watt, Rodney, Patrol Officer, Highland Park, IL.................. 50
Welter, John, Assistant Chief of Police, San Diego Police
Department..................................................... 44
Wilkins, Robert L., Attorney, Washington, DC..................... 16
APPENDIX
Proposed Legislation
Bill S. 821...................................................... 65
Additional Submissions for the Record
Cohen, John, Director, Community Crime Fighting Project,
Progressive Policy Institute................................... 70
Hampton, Ronald E., Executive Director, National Black Police
Association.................................................... 79
Jackson, Kelly, Oregon, WI, letter............................... 76
Murphy-Smith, Karen, letter...................................... 77
Shelton, Hilary O., Director, Washington Bureau of the National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People.............. 69
RACIAL PROFILING WITHIN LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES
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THURSDAY, MARCH 30, 2000
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee on the Constitution, Federalism,
and Property Rights,
Committee on the Judiciary,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:05 p.m., in
room SD-226, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. John Ashcroft
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Also present: Senators Feingold, Kennedy, and Torricelli
[ex officio].
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN ASHCROFT, A U.S. SENATOR FROM
THE STATE OF MISSOURI
Senator Ashcroft. Good afternoon. Let me thank all of you
for coming. It is a pleasure to call this meeting of the
Constitution Subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee to
order. I want to thank every one of you for attending this
hearing on the subject of racial profiling by law enforcement.
Racial profiling is the use of race either as the sole
predictor or one element in a group of predictors of potential
illegal or criminal activity that justify traffic stops or
border searches or airport detentions. It is a subject of
growing public debate, particularly in recent months.
It is appropriate for this subcommittee to hold a hearing
on this subject because it has clear constitutional
implications. Our Constitution's 14th Amendment guarantees all
persons the equal protection of the law, and the Supreme Court
has made clear that any consideration of race by government
officials, except in the narrowest of circumstances, is
inconsistent with the 14th Amendment's guarantee of equal
protection.
As applied to today's inquiry, while it is undoubtedly
permissible to use a particular criminal suspect's race as an
identifier, using race broadly as a profiler in lieu of
individualized suspicion is, I believe, an unconstitutional
practice. In other words, if I am mugged by a caucasian male 6
foot 7 and 230 pounds, the police consider that, and they are
entitled to and should consider that suspect's race in looking
for the man who mugged me. What they cannot constitutionally
do, in my judgment, is to start pulling over all caucasians in
the future because they believe that they commit a
disproportionate number of muggings.
Today, we will hear testimony about various serious
allegations that traffic stops and other detentions happen on
the basis of race, though there are differing points of view
about the prevalence of the practice. Some will provide
evidence that the practice is very prevalent and others that it
is the result of random misdeeds in the law enforcement
community.
We will also hear about the proposed legislation, the
Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act, which is designed to try
and find out exactly the extent or how large the problem is.
That legislation is sponsored in the Senate by the ranking
member of this subcommittee, my friend Senator Feingold, and
Senator Lautenberg, who I am pleased is on our first panel
today, and by Congressman Conyers in the House.
We do need to find out how big the issue is, and I think
the concepts included in the Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act
represent a good start. I have some suggestions on how I think
it could be improved. In particular, I would respectfully
suggest that the statute make clear that the Attorney General's
study of State and local law enforcement traffic stop data
would be made from data collected voluntarily by those
departments. It is my understanding that it is the intent of
the bill, but I think the legislation would be well served to
make that explicit by way of clarification.
Second, there are a few areas where I think that the data
collected by the Attorney General should be expanded in order
to get as full a picture as possible of what is happening on
our highways and streets. In addition to the current provision
that the Attorney General collect data about the traffic
infraction alleged to have been committed that led to the stop,
the Attorney General should consider any other factors
supporting the officer's decision to make a traffic stop.
In addition, I think that it would be useful for the
Attorney General to consider factors such as the race of the
officer making the stop, the racial composition of the area in
which the stop was made, and any other factors that will give
us as full a picture as possible as to how officers are
conducting traffic stops.
Finally, I think it would be beneficial to explain that
nothing in this bill changes any burdens of proof for parties
in litigation. It is my hope that Senator Feingold and the
other Senate cosponsors will consider these suggestions because
I think that with these changes, I could have the opportunity
to completely support the measure.
In any event, regardless of the prevalence of racial
profiling, the mere fact that these allegations exist troubles
me greatly. It troubles me not only for the constitutional
implications that it raises, but also for the extraordinarily
destructive effect that such allegations would have on the
confidence of people in Government.
A necessary component of our system of Government is public
trust. No system of government, of the people, by the people,
and for the people can long endure if some of the people have
no confidence in the fairness of that government. So long as
whole groups of our citizens believe that there is a two-tiered
system of treatment by Government officials arbitrarily divided
by race, they won't have confidence in that system. They will
understandably conclude that if Government is improperly
motivated by race in some circumstances, it might be improperly
motivated by race in all circumstances.
This is particularly true if that perception is held of law
enforcement, the very Government agency entrusted with
protecting citizens from injustice. Such an erosion of trust
would not only undermine the ability of law enforcement
officers to do their jobs, it would undermine any efforts that
we in Government make to try and improve the lives of all
Americans through Government.
With this in mind, the purpose of this hearing today is
threefold: first, to raise public awareness of the issue
regarding racial profiling; second, to discuss what we might do
legislatively to understand more fully the extent of that
problem; and, third, and most importantly, to try to restore
some of the lost confidence and trust of some Americans by
demonstrating that Government can work to correct any abuses
that are even its own.
I will now turn the floor over to the ranking member of the
subcommittee, Senator Feingold, and thank him for his concern
in this respect.
STATEMENT OF HON. RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE
STATE OF WISCONSIN
Senator Feingold. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and welcome to
all of our witnesses and those in the audience. Mr. Chairman,
we always say thanks at these moments and we always mean it,
but I especially mean it today because this is a very
significant thing that you are willing to hold this hearing.
I know that it is sometimes unusual around here for
Democrats and Republicans to work together, but I am grateful
for the collegial working relationship we have had over the
years and for the constructive efforts of you and your staff to
discuss this issue today. This is exceptional, as I have said.
I am pleased and I am not at all surprised to hear that you
share my concern that racial profiling is an unacceptable law
enforcement tool. In fact, I am told that this is the first
time this has ever happened, that there has never been a
hearing on this in the Congress before, until you consented to
this. And I appreciate the strength of your statement, the
passion of it, and also your reference to the constitutional
issues.
At first glance, the changes you have outlined to S. 821,
the Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act, appear reasonable and
helpful. I am confident that we can work out the details
quickly, and once that is done I look forward to welcoming you
as a cosponsor to the bill. I believe your support is crucial
to getting this bill through the Senate and enacted into law
this year, and I am very pleased that you have been willing to
roll up your sleeves and get this done. So I thank you very,
very much.
I also, of course, thank Representative Conyers, who helped
initiate this issue in the Congress, and, of course, my good
friend Frank Lautenberg, who is the principal author of this
legislation. I am the second name on the bill. He has taken a
real lead role. A good part of my week has been praising
Senator Lautenberg for his work on the Budget Committee, his
work on the environment, his work on transportation and many
other issues during his career. But this is a very important
one to add to the list and I thank him for his leadership.
Mr. Chairman, our Nation has faced many difficult struggles
involving issues of race, justice and equality. Fortunately, we
have made great advances this century in ensuring that all
Americans receive equal justice under the law. But we still
face significant problems of racial injustice and
discrimination. There are serious questions about whether
African-American and other minority juveniles receive prison
sentences at a disproportionately higher rate than white
juveniles.
There are serious questions about whether African-Americans
and Hispanic-Americans are subject to the death penalty
disproportionately compared to whites. And for the millions of
African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans and other Americans of
racial or ethnic minority backgrounds who drive on our Nation's
streets and highways, there is the fear of being stopped for no
apparent reason other than the color of their skin.
This law enforcement tool, known as racial profiling,
targets drivers for heightened scrutiny or harassment because
of the color of their skin, with an alleged traffic violation
used as a pretext. Parroting the well-known acronym for drunk
driving, DWI, racial profiling has been called DWB, or driving
while black or driving while brown.
I want to emphasize that I don't believe that all or even
most law enforcement officers engage in this terrible practice.
I believe that the vast majority of our men and women in blue
are honorable people who fulfil their duties without engaging
in racial profiling. But as we will hear today, the experience
of many African-Americans and Hispanic-Americans is very real.
There is simply no doubt that some officers unfortunately do
engage in this practice.
There are some--and I stress only some--law enforcement
agencies or officers in our country who have decided that if
you are African-American or Latino, you are more likely to be
trafficking drugs or engaged in other illegal activities than a
white person, despite statistical evidence to the contrary.
In a May 1999 report, the American Civil Liberties Union
described a study that found that along I-95 in Maryland, while
only roughly 17 percent of the total drivers and traffic
violators are African-American, an astonishing 73 percent of
the drivers searched are African-American. We are going to hear
more today about the scope of this problem, including from the
principal author of the ACLU report. Of course, the legislation
that Senator Lautenberg and I have sponsored will allow us to
get a clearer picture of what is happening.
Mr. Chairman, whether in Maryland, Wisconsin, or Missouri,
all Americans must have the right to travel from place to place
free of harassment, especially from harassment by their own
Government. No one in America should be considered suspicious
and have to live in fear of being pulled over, detained and
searched because of the color of his or her skin.
As we will hear today, victims of racial profiling are
forced to endure an incredibly humiliating experience,
sometimes even a physically threatening one, on roadsides or in
the back seat of police cruisers. Why? Because of the color of
their skin. Not just African-Americans and Latinos, but all
Americans should feel threatened when any one of us is denied
our personal liberty in such an insidious and humiliating way.
In 21st century America, racial profiling is not only
indefensible, it is an affront to our Nation's fundamental
principles of justice, liberty and equality.
Mr. Chairman, this practice has another significant
negative impact that I would like to just touch on here, and
that is the damage it does--and you have focused on this
already--to the trust between law enforcement and the community
and to our criminal justice system. Racial profiling leaves a
scar not only on those Americans who are harassed, but on
relations between law enforcement and the community that police
officers have pledged to protect and serve.
Where can African-Americans and Latinos turn for help when
they believe that the men and women in uniform cannot be
trusted? As an Hispanic American testified recently in Glencoe,
IL, on his family's experience with being profiled repeatedly,
``who is there left to protect us? The police just violated
us.''
This is profoundly disturbing to me and I hope to all
Americans. Racial profiling chips away at the important trust
that law enforcement agencies take great pains to develop with
the community, and we have seen when that trust is broken that
it can lead to an escalation of tensions between the police and
the community, as well as detrimental effects on our criminal
justice system, like jury nullification and the failure to
convict criminals because the community no longer believes the
police officer on the witness stand.
Racial profiling is clearly bad policing, and it has a
ripple effect whose consequences we are only beginning to feel.
In just the last year since the traffic stops statistics study
bill was introduced, we have already seen increased awareness
of this problem in the law enforcement community and an
increased willingness to address it. As we will hear today,
there are a growing number of police departments that have
already begun collecting traffic stops data voluntarily. In
fact, over 100 State and local police departments have now
committed to compiling data. In addition, a number of States
have passed or are considering legislation requiring their
police departments to collect this data.
These are very positive developments. These State and local
efforts underscore the need for a Federal role in collecting
and analyzing traffic stops data to give Congress and the
public a national picture of the extent of the racial profiling
problem and lay the groundwork for national solutions to end
this horrendous practice.
I am pleased to have joined my distinguish colleague,
Senator Lautenberg, in introducing this legislation. The bill
would require the Attorney General to conduct an initial
analysis of existing data on racial profiling and then design a
study to gather data from a nationwide sampling of
jurisdictions.
This is a straightforward bill. It only requires the
Attorney General to conduct a study, plain and simple. It
doesn't tell police officers how to do their jobs and it
doesn't mandate data collection by police departments. The
Attorney General's sampling study would be based on data
collected from police departments that voluntarily agree to
participate in the Justice Department study.
President Clinton has endorsed S. 821, and last June he
directed Federal law enforcement agencies to begin collecting
and reporting data on the race, ethnicity and gender of the
people they stop and search at our Nation's borders and
airports. A coalition of civil rights groups and law
enforcement organizations also support this legislation, and I
am pleased that Senator Torricelli and Senator Kennedy, who is
here, have joined as cosponsors. I am hopeful that more of our
colleagues on the full committee will agree to be cosponsors of
this important initiative. The House of Representatives passed
a similar bill in the 105th Congress, and just a few weeks ago
the House Judiciary Committee passed a bill without amendment.
So I hope that with your great help, Mr. Chairman, we can
move the bill through the committee promptly. Thank you for
your being patient with my long statement. I do care about this
issue deeply, and I again thank you and I think the Senate and
public will benefit from the light that we are shining on this
problem today.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you very much.
The Senator from Massachusetts is recognized.
STATEMENT OF HON. EDWARD M. KENNEDY, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE
STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS
Senator Kennedy. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will put
my statement in the record and just commend you for having the
hearings, and my colleagues, Senators Lautenberg and Feingold,
and John Conyers, for going ahead.
It appears to me--and I would be interested when Senator
Lautenberg makes his comments--that this is an extremely modest
proposal. What we are basically talking about is the collection
of information and statistics. It seems to me that given the
kind or reality of this situation and the modesty but the
importance of this kind of program, unlike so many of the other
things that we have before us in the Congress, we ought to be
able to take action on this.
I was interested in Senator Feingold, who is a real expert
on the particular legislation, commenting upon your own
observations and suggestions, at how reasonable those were and
that there would be a real opportunity to move forward in this
area.
Just finally, I would hope that maybe Senator Lautenberg
would also give us his own best judgment--and this will come
out in the questions--about what steps he thinks are going to
be necessary to follow on if we were able to implement this. We
have got a number of the States that are collecting some
information, but what he really thinks can be done after we get
this information. I know that is not directly the subject of
it, but I think it is important that we hear it.
I would just say finally, Mr. Chairman, I was mindful of
that excellent statement that was made by, I think, Anna
Quindlen on March 13. She said, ``Police officers are just us
wearing uniforms. The assumptions they make and the prejudices
they carry with them are the assumptions and prejudices of
their roots, their neighborhoods and their society.'' She went
on to write that, ``This is the way in which race changes
everything, often in a subtle or unconscious fashion.''
So this is enormously important, even though it is a modest
program, and an enormously important hearing, a very important
initiative. I am delighted that we are having the hearing and
hopefully it will result in action.
I thank the Chair.
[The prepared statement of Senator Kennedy follows:]
Prepared Statement of Senator Kennedy
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I commend you and Senator Feingold for
working together to schedule this hearing. Racial profiling by law
enforcement officers is a disgraceful practice, and it is high time
that the Senate addresses this issue.
I pay particular tribute to our distinguished colleague from the
House, Representative John Conyers, the Ranking Member of the House
Judiciary Committee. For several years, Representative Conyers has led
the fight for legislation on racial profiling, and it was successfully
passed by the House in the last Congress. Thank you for being here
today, and I look forward to your testimony.
Traffic and vehicle codes are highly detailed and complex and
almost everyone is violating some part of them. That means that law
enforcement officers can choose to stop almost anyone, and that
officers who have biased attitudes and unscrupulous officers have a
free hand to discriminate. Some try to justify racial profiling by
claiming that it is efficient and necessary to fight drugs and guns.
That argument is flatly wrong. It is based on the shameful and bigoted
assumption that minorities are likely to be law breakers.
Professor John Lamberth of Temple University conducted a detailed
study of the New Jersey Turnpike and the percentage of drivers
violating the law. Over 98 percent of the cars were speeding and
therefor subject to being stopped by the state police. Obviously, the
police have the power to pull over anyone they choose. African-
Americans made up 15 percent of the speeders, not statistically
different from their proportion of the driving population.
But 35 percent of the drivers pulled over were black. The average
black driver was almost four times more likely to be pulled over than a
non-black driver.
On Interstate 95 in Maryland, a similar study was conducted. In
fact, we have one of our witnesses today to thank for it. Robert
Wilkins and his family were the victims of a discriminatory stop by the
Maryland State Police. But they picked the wrong family to stop that
day. He had the courage, determination and legal skills to defend his
constitutional rights and hold the police accountable.
The Maryland study showed that for every 1,000 searches by the
Maryland State Police, exactly 28 percent of the drivers the police
chose to search were carrying some kind of contraband that warranted an
arrest. And there was no difference between black drivers and white
drivers--none, at all--28 percent of blacks and 28 percent of whites.
That result is no surprise. National Institute of Drug Abuse
statistics show that African-Americans are no more likely to abuse
drugs than whites, and the Maryland study shows that they are no more
likely to transport drugs than whites. Yet, they are still targeted for
a disproportionate number of stops and searches, and are over 12 times
more likely to be arrested than white drivers.
The lesson is obvious. If you enforce the law against blacks,
you'll find and arrest more black offenders and it will look like
blacks are the ones violating the law. If you enforce the law against
whites--or against people with blond hair, or against people driving
green cars--you'll get the same results. The group you target will look
like they're the principal offenders violating the law.
The problem is just as serious for Hispanic drivers. Operation
Pipeline is an attempt to use the traffic laws as a tool for drug
interdiction, and it is clearly targeting Hispanic drivers. An
examination of over 30,000 Operation Pipeline stops in California
showed only a 2 percent success rate. That means 29,400 people were
pulled over for no valid reason at all--and a disproportionately high
percentage of them were Hispanic.
The conclusions are clear. Racial profiling is an abomination. DWB
or DWH--Driving While Black or Driving While Hispanic--is not an
offense, or America isn't America. It's time we stopped racial
profiling--now and for good.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you.
Now, it is my pleasure to turn to Senator Lautenberg, who
is a cosponsor of this measure, who has introduced the Traffic
Stops Statistics Study Act in the Senate.
Congressman Conyers was scheduled to be here with us today,
but he had a scheduling conflict arise this morning. I just
want to note now before the Senator begins his remarks that we
will keep the record open for any statement that Representative
Conyers chooses to submit.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Conyers follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. John Conyers, Jr., a U.S. Representative in
Congress From the State of Michigan
Race-based traffic stops turn driving, one of our most ordinary and
fundamentally American activities, into an experience fraught with
danger and risk for people of color. The offense of ``D.W.B.'' or
``driving while black and brown'' is well-known to African-Americans
and Hispanics across the country. There are virtually no African-
American males--including Congressmen, actors, athletes and office
workers--who have not been stopped for a pretextual traffic violation.
Because traffic stops can happen anywhere and anytime, millions of
African-Americans and Latinos alter their driving habits in ways that
would never occur to most white Americans. Some intentionally drive
bland cars or change the way they dress. Others who drive long
distances factor in extra time for the traffic stops that seem
inevitable. Some completely avoid places like all-white suburbs, where
they fear police harassment for looking ``out of place.''
This very fear was confirmed by a group of police officers from
Highland Park, Illinois. These officers had the courage to confirm a
fact that minority drivers across the nation have known for years:
police departments routinely employ discriminatory racial profiling
tactics designed to ambush innocent minority drivers.
In sworn affidavits, the officers detailed shocking incidents of
race related traffic stops and police policies that clearly warrant
federal investigation. The allegations of the Highland Park officers
are unique in the fact that white law abiding officers have advanced
the profiling claim and broken the wall of silence that has hindered
other investigations.
The courage shown by these officers in coming forward will send a
tremor through the law enforcement community. In the face of tremendous
anecdotal and quantitative evidence to the contrary, some national
police groups have consistently denied the existence of racial
profiling. Because these officers have broken the wall of silence,
never again can there be a denial of the stories of the minority
community concerning their treatment at the hands of the police.
The traffic stops bill is intended to provide a comprehensive
analysis of the scope and magnitude of the racial profiling problem by
requiring the Department of Justice to conduct a nationwide study of
traffic code violation stops by law enforcement officers.
This legislation is a recognition of the manifest complaints by
minority drivers nationwide. The legislation is not punitive, nor does
it indict the conduct of individual police officers--most of whom are
simply trying to do their jobs.
While the catch phrase ``driving while black'' captures the
perception of the minority community, the definition and legal
implications of racial profiling defy such simplification.
The most sound definition of racial profiling embraces the
widespread police practice of using race as a factor in deciding whom
to target for law enforcement. Properly understood, racial profiling
occurs whenever police routinely use race as a negative signal that,
along with an accumulation of other signals, causes an officer to react
with suspicion.
Some commentators define racial profiling as occurring when a
police officer stops, questions or arrests someone solely on the basis
of race or ethnicity. This crude definition evokes the completely
discredited exercise of power by bigoted law enforcement officers
intent on harassment.
To condemn police officers who engage in such tactics, however,
requires no real confrontation with the complex intersection between
race, crime and law enforcement because few would defend police
surveillance triggered solely by race. Such a definition diverts
attention from the more complex use of race as trigger for suspicion
that captures a disproportionate number of minorities.
Media coverage of the phenomenon of racial profiling has produced
an abundance of anecdotal evidence concerning abusive practices. The
stories in the press, combined with statistics, lawsuits and recent
legislative action, make a powerful argument that ``driving while
black'' is not just an occasional problem.
Statistical evidence gathered in the course of litigation shows a
clear pattern of racially discriminatory traffic stops and searches.
Although African-Americans make up only 14 percent of the population
nationwide, they account for 72 percent of all routine traffic stops.
An ACLU analysis of Maryland State Police data showed that 73
percent of cars stopped and searched on Interstate 95 between Baltimore
and Delaware from January 1995 through September 1997 were those of
African-Americans, despite the fact that only 14 percent of those
driving along that stretch were black. Similarly, in Florida, 70
percent of the persons stopped on I-95 were African-American, even
though they made up less than 10 percent of the driving population.
Hispanics are similarly targeted for a disproportionate law
enforcement focus. An ACLU analysis of Illinois State Police data found
that, while Hispanics comprise less than eight percent of the
population and take fewer than three percent of all personal vehicle
trips, they comprise approximately 30 percent of the motorists stopped
by state police drug interdiction officers for discretionary offenses
and comprised 27 percent of all searches.
These dramatic statistics have formed the basis for legal findings
against the practice of racial profiling across the nation. Lawsuits
challenging racial profiling have been filed all across the country.
Most recently, New Jersey settled the first ever racial profiling case
brought by the Justice Department under 42 U.S.C.A. 14141. The consent
decree in that case appoints an independent monitor, requires the state
to collect traffic stop data and to create new citizen complaint,
training and early warning procedures for the state police.
While racial profiling practices by law enforcement have been
expanding, the Supreme Court's sensitivity to Fourth Amendment rights
has been contracting. In Whren v. United States, the Supreme Court
declared that any traffic offense committed by a driver was a
legitimate legal basis for a stop, regardless of the officer's
subjective state of mind.
In practice, the Whren decision has given the police virtually
unlimited authority to stop and search any vehicle. Because state
traffic codes identify so many different infractions, every driver
probably violates some provision of the vehicle code at some time,
during even a short drive. As a result, the controversy around racial
profiling will continue to grow.
Widespread racial profiling practices deeply undermine the
legitimacy and effectiveness of the criminal justice system, making
police work much more difficult and dangerous. As we have seen in
Highland Park, police officers themselves recognize the injustice of
these practices and are beginning to speak out in favor of change.
While it does not regulate traffic stops, set standards for them,
or require implementation of particular policies, the Traffic Stops
Bill does require the gathering of solid, comprehensive information, so
that discussion of racial profiling might move beyond the question of
whether or not the problem exists, to the question of how to find a
solution.
Senator Ashcroft. It is a pleasure to welcome the Senator
from New Jersey, Senator Lautenberg.
STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK LAUTENBERG, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE
STATE OF NEW JERSEY
Senator Lautenberg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and allow me
to convey particular thanks to Senator Feingold and Senator
Kennedy, both of whom have had an active interest in this
issue, and Senator Feingold for urging us forward, and thanking
you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing. It has obviously
attracted attention because it is such an important issue.
To Senator Kennedy's remarks about this being a relatively
modest proposal, it is true that this is a first step, but when
the first step is such a departure from existing practice, it
is a giant step. We just ask the Attorney General to do the
study and then help us prepare a way over the next couple of
years to get grants to communities to make sure that we get the
data that we need to have to make intelligent decisions and to
cure what I think is an epidemic of injustice.
Senator Feingold and I spent the morning with the budget,
and I thank him for his nice comments. This is kind of a swan
song period for me. But I will continue to work hard, to
demonstate that lame ducks can fly.
There has been an ugly practice across the country and it
has emerged over some time. So many motorists live with the
fear that they are going to be pulled over for nothing more
than the color of their skin. The problem is that occasionally
some law enforcement officers have inappropriately engaged in a
practice called racial profiling.
Senator Feingold said it very clearly: the men and women in
uniform doing law enforcement work are people that we can
generally be very proud of. They do a good job and are an
integral part of having a society of laws. But there are some
who overstep their bounds, and we have to be very careful about
that. These people unfairly assume that drivers of a particular
race are more likely to be criminals, and this discrimination
is wrong and it has got to stop.
When patrolling our Nation's highways and streets, the only
colors that police officers ought to be concerned about are red
and green lights and yellow stripes. But they ought to be
color-blind when it comes to a driver's race, and any
violation, as we all here know, of civil rights is
unacceptable.
But it is particularly disturbing when alleged violations
involve law enforcement officers. No one is safe when those who
are hired to uphold the law treat it with contempt. As we
consider this issue, we have to remember that lots of law
enforcement officers--and I have heard it personally and seen
it--have spoken out against racial profiling. They don't want
to be tainted by the errant actions of some of their fellow
officers.
Racial profiling has been a serious problem in my home
State of New Jersey, and would that it was only New Jersey that
had the problem and we could fix it right away. But we learned
as we began to examine the problem that this is a serious
problem all across our country.
In New Jersey, we had a State judge find that some State
troopers engaged in the practice of racial profiling. We have
had testimony that some troopers were trained to use profiling,
and we have had a shooting at a van with some athletes
traveling down the New Jersey Turnpike. Fortunately, nobody was
killed. And we have seen other unwarranted physical
intimidation of minority motorists on the New Jersey Turnpike
and other State roads.
As a result of a Department of Justice investigation, the
New Jersey Police admitted that some of their officers had
engaged in racial profiling, and agreed to comprehensive
reform. But while New Jersey is working to end racial
profiling, we need to address the problem on a national basis,
and that is why I joined with Representative Conyers in
introducing the Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act.
By requiring the Attorney General to complete a study on
racial profiling, this legislation will give us a better
understanding of the scope of the problem and give us ideas on
how to end discrimination in any communities where it is
occurring. Representative Conyers has always been a strong
leader on civil rights, and I am pleased to be working with him
on this issue. But I again pay special thanks to my initial
cosponsor, Senator Feingold, for his important contribution on
the effort to end this ugly practice.
We now have 17 Senate cosponsors, and I hope that all of
the members of this subcommittee will work to pass this bill
and pass it quickly. Again, to go back to Senator Kennedy's
remarks, it is a modest proposal. It shouldn't take an awful
lot of effort to get this in place, to show people that we are
serious about it, that this Government of ours will not accept
racial profiling or practices similar to that where people are
discriminated against because of their skin color.
So I thank you once again, Mr. Chairman, and I hope that we
will be able to expeditiously move this legislation.
Senator Ashcroft. I thank you, Senator. Your testimony is
helpful.
Our next panel is comprised of three individuals to tell
about their own experiences in regard to this issue.
And as I thank the Senator, I welcome you to supplement
your testimony with written materials, if you choose to. But I
would invite the next panel to come forward. Members of the
next panel include U.S. Army Master Sergeant Rossano Gerald,
from Fort Hood, TX; Mr. Robert Wilkins, an attorney from
Washington, DC; and Curtis Rodriquez, also an attorney from San
Jose, CA. I thank you for being here today and am grateful for
your attendance.
Master Sergeant Gerald, it is a pleasure to have you here.
Thank you for being here. It is my understanding that you have
asked to supplement your testimony with a very short video at
the end of your testimony. Is that the way you would like to
handle it?
Sgt. Gerald. Mr. Chairman, you could do it either at the
beginning or the end.
Senator Ashcroft. Well, why don't you give us your
testimony first and then if you don't mind, we will watch the
video. It is my understanding it is just 2 minutes long, so
don't put anybody to sleep with your testimony or they will
miss the video.
Please, just speak up. I am having a little trouble hearing
you. Just please make yourself heard. It is important that we
get the facts as you would bring them to us.
Would you please proceed?
PANEL CONSISTING OF ROSSANO GERALD, FORT HOOD, TX; ROBERT L.
WILKINS, WASHINGTON, DC; AND CURTIS V. RODRIGUEZ, SAN JOSE, CA
STATEMENT OF ROSSANO GERALD
Sergeant Gerald. Good afternoon, Chairman Ashcroft, Senator
Feingold, and the members of the committee. My name is Master
Sergeant Gerald. I am glad to have an opportunity today to talk
to you about an experience I had in Oklahoma.
The issue of racial profiling is a serious problem in this
country today. I am glad to see that the Senate is beginning to
take a look at it. I am coming forward today to tell my story
to prevent this from happening again. I don't want anything
like this to happen again to my son.
In August 1998, I was driving to Oklahoma on a family
reunion. At the time, I was a sergeant first class stationed in
Fort Ritchie, MD. My 12-year-old son Gregory was with me. As
soon as we crossed the border from Arkansas, I noticed patrol
cars in the area and began driving even more carefully than
usual. Within minutes, an officer pulled me over, saying that I
was following the other car too closely. He did not give me a
citation.
Soon after that, we stopped to get gas and went to the
restroom. After our break, we continued driving. After being
stopped once already, I was driving particularly carefully. I
was in the right lane, when I saw two patrol cars approaching
the ramp. I signaled, pulled over to the left and let them in.
I said to my son, watch this, I bet they stop me again. Sure
enough, I was pulled over again.
An officer walked to the rear of the car and told me to get
into the patrol car. I later learned that his name was Trooper
Perry. Once he had me in the car, he started questioning me. I
told him that my son was still in the car, and left and got my
son, frisked him, and brought him back to the patrol car.
He told me that I had changed lanes without using my turn
signal. I told him I used my signals and I asked him how he was
able to see from his vantage point on the ramp.
The trooper started writing me a warning ticket and asked
me questions. He asked me was I nervous. I told him, no, I was
not nervous, but I was upset. I had just been stopped by other
troopers. Then he asked me more questions about my destination,
my point of origin, and my military assignment.
Trooper Perry informed me that he had just made a drug
bust, and asked to search my car. I said no. I asked him to
call my company commander, Captain Rhodes, because it is the
standard operating procedure for the Army. He refused. He would
not let me call my company commander, Captain Rhodes, on my
cell phone. I asked him again later to call my company
commander. Again, he refused.
Trooper Perry gave me a warning ticket, but told me that I
was not free to go. Trooper Perry continued to ask me questions
and badgering me about why I wouldn't let him search my car if
I had nothing to hide. I said politely, no, and he said if I
was carrying any weapons or contraband? I informed him that I
was not.
Trooper Perry then stated that it was legal for him to
search my car without my consent. Trooper Perry called for the
K-9 unit from the second patrol car. I said I wanted to watch
the search, so I got out of the car. The dog walked around
outside the vehicle. The dog did not alert, did not bark, did
not scratch, did not whimper, did not sit, although the trooper
kept patting certain areas of the car and would not let the dog
walk away.
Even though the dog did not alert, the second trooper
patted the right wheel well and claimed that the dog had
alerted. He said he would conduct a full-scale search now. I
have been training in using dogs and I thought the search was
highly improper and unusually leading.
Trooper Perry ordered Gregory and me to get back in the
car. At this point, I was really worried that the troopers were
going to plant illegal contraband in my car. Trooper Perry then
got the drill and took over the search. He began drilling
underneath the carpet at the feet of the passenger side.
Trooper Perry came back to the car and stated that he found
something. The troopers spoke privately. I was accused of
having a secret compartment in my car containing drug residue.
The compartment was actually a footrest that was a feature of
the car.
I was handcuffed by Trooper Perry, who manhandled me,
thrust me into the car and strapped me in. He turned off the
on-board camera and took out the tape. The second trooper
searched my car. At this point, Trooper Perry and the other
trooper left the hood of the patrol cars up. The action had no
obvious purpose. I was worried that they were trying to
obstruct my view so they could plant contraband in my car.
During the search, we overheard Trooper Perry on the radio
talking to his headquarters. He told them that he couldn't find
anything; nothing turned up. The other trooper told him to keep
searching. He asked if he needed backup. By this point, a third
unit showed up at the site. The K-9 trooper moved my son into
the car with the dog and asked him questions without my being
present. The second trooper asked the same questions. The dog
kept barking at Gregory, who was afraid he would get bitten.
The trooper put our luggage on the ground and had the dog
sniff it. They found airline tickets, one of which was to
Chicago. The trooper asked me about it. I answered that Gregory
had flown out of Chicago. And he asked me again about drugs. I
informed him that my car had passed inspection and received
military clearance, and because of my military assignment, I
was subject to random urinalysis tests and would never do
drugs. Trooper Perry was angry that I would not give him
details about my classified assignment. I suggested that he
contact my commander again.
After 2 hours, the troopers let me go with nothing more
than a warning ticket. I was told that I was being let go
because I was behaving myself. I claimed the car and the
baggage were a mess, and Trooper Perry said we ain't good at
repacking. Trooper Perry had removed parts of my headliner,
floor boards, carpet, and other areas. There was over $1,000
worth of damage.
As soon as I was released, I called Captain Rhodes, my
company commander. He advised me to go to Fort Sill, OK, where
the Director of Public Safety searched my vehicle in case drugs
were planted in my car. An Army-certified narcotics working dog
did not find any drugs or any contraband in my car.
This experience was very traumatic for Gregory. Throughout
the interrogation, he was frightened and crying. Even before he
was removed from my presence, he was nervous, crying, and he
was hyperventilating. I had to watch my son suffer tremendous
physical discomfort from the heat. Trooper Perry had turned off
the air conditioning when he put us in the car, despite the 95-
degree heat.
Before he released us, one of the troopers asked who would
come get Gregory if I was arrested. This remark made my son
more nervous and upset. He was crying. He was wondering what
would happen to him and I tried to calm him down. He was scared
for the rest of the trip. My son has since become afraid of
dogs. He continues to ask his mother why he was treated this
way.
I was very humiliated by this experience. I was
embarrassed. I was ashamed that people driving by would think I
had committed a crime. It was particularly hard to be treated
like a criminal in front of my impressionable young son. I
never thought I would find myself in the position of suing
police officers. I am an authority figure myself. I served our
country in Somalia and in the Gulf War. I don't want my son to
think that this kind of behavior of anyone in uniform is
acceptable. I hope that coming forward to tell my story might
prevent other people of color from being treated this way.
That is it, sir.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you, Master Sergeant Gerald.
[Videotape shown.]
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you, Master Sergeant Gerald. I hope
that your son gets an opportunity to see your appearance here
because frankly I know it won't repair the problem, but I think
he should know that there are people who care and that you are
doing something more than just fix a blame, you are trying to
fix a problem, and I think that is very important.
I thank you very much for coming.
Sergeant Gerald. Thank you, sir.
[The prepared statement of Sergeant Gerald follows:]
Prepared Statement of Rossano Gerald
Good afternoon Chairman Ashcroft, Senator Feingold and other
members of the Committee. My name is Master Sergeant Rossano Gerald. I
am glad to have an opportunity to talk with you today about my
experience in Oklahoma. The issue of racial profiling is a serious
problem in this country today and I am glad to see that the Senate is
beginning to take a look at it. I am coming forward to tell my story to
try to prevent this from happening again. I don't want anything like
this to happen to my son again.
In August of 1998, I was driving in Oklahoma on my way to a family
reunion. At that time I was a Sergeant First class in the Army
stationed in Fort Richie. My 12-year-old son Gregory was with me. As
soon as we crossed the border from Arkansas, I noticed patrol cars in
the area and began driving even more carefully than usual. Within
minutes, an officer pulled me over for ``following another car too
closely.'' He did not give me a citation. Soon after, we stopped to buy
gas and use the restroom.
After our break we continued driving. Having been stopped once
already, I was driving particularly carefully. I was in the right hand
lane when I saw two patrol cars approach on the ramp. I signaled, then
pulled over to let them in. I said to my son, ``Watch this, I bet
they'll stop me again.'' Sure enough, I was pulled over again.
An officer walked to the rear of my car and told me to get in the
patrol car. I later learned that his name was Trooper Perry. Once he
had me in the car and started questioning me, I told him that my son
was still in my car. He left and got Gregory and frisked him before
putting him in the back of the patrol car. He told me that I had
changed lanes without signaling. I told him that I had signaled, and
asked how he would have been able to see from his vantage point on the
ramp.
Trooper Perry started writing me a warning ticket and asking me
questions. He asked me why I was nervous. I told him that I was not
nervous, but upset because I had just been stopped by another trooper.
He then asked me more questions about my destination, my point of
origin and my military assignment.
Trooper Perry informed me that he had just made a drug bust and
asked to search my car, and I said no. I asked him to call my
Commanding Officer, Captain Rhodes, because it is standard operating
procedure for the army. He refused. He would not let me call Captain
Rhodes on my cell phone. I asked him again later to call my Commanding
Officer and again he refused. Trooper Perry gave me the warning ticket
but told me that I was not free to go.
Trooper Perry continued asking me questions. He badgered me about
why I would not let him search my car if I had nothing to hide. I was
polite but would not let him search my car. He asked me if I was
carrying any weapons or contraband and I informed him that I was not.
Trooper Perry then stated that it was legal for him to search my car
without my consent.
Trooper Perry called for the K-9 unit from the second patrol car. I
said I wanted to watch the search and we got out of the car. The dog
walked around the outside of the vehicle. The dog did not ``alert.'' He
did not bark, scratch, whimper or sit down, although the trooper kept
patting certain areas of the car and would not let the dog walk away.
Even though the dog did not alert, the second trooper patted the right
wheel well and claimed that the dog had alerted. He said he would
conduct a full scale search now. I have been trained in using dogs and
thought that the search was highly improper and unusually suggestive.
Trooper Perry ordered Gregory and me to get back into the car. At
this point, I became really worried that the Troopers were gong to
plant illegal contraband in my car. Trooper Perry then got the drill
and took over the search. He began drilling under the carpet at the
feet of the passenger side. Trooper Perry came back to the car and
stated that he had found ``something.'' The two troopers spoke
privately. I was then accused of having a secret compartment in my car
that had drug residue in it. This compartment was actually a footrest
that was a feature of the car.
I was then handcuffed by Trooper Perry who manhandled me, thrust me
into his car and then strapped me in. He turned off the on-board camera
and took out the tape. The second trooper continued the search of my
car. At one point, Trooper Perry and the other officer lifted the hoods
of their patrol cars, an action that had no obvious purpose. I was
worried that they were trying to obstruct my view so that they could
plant contraband in my car.
During the search we overheard Trooper Perry on the radio with
another trooper. He told the other trooper that he was turning up
nothing. The other trooper told him to keep searching and asked if he
needed back up. By this point a third unit had appeared.
This trooper moved Gregory into his car and asked him questions
without me being present. The second trooper brought the drug dog to
the car that Gregory was in and asked him some of the same questions.
The dog kept barking at Gregory, who was afraid it would bite him.
The troopers put our luggage on the ground and had the dogs sniff
it. They found airline tickets, one of which was to Chicago. When the
trooper asked me about it, I answered that Gregory had flown out of
Chicago. Because he had again asked me about drugs, I informed him that
my car had passed inspection and received military clearance and that
because of my military assignment, I was subject to random urinalysis
tests and would never do drugs. Trooper Perry was angry that I would
not give him details about my classified assignment. I suggested that
he contact my Commanding Officer.
At 3:45 p.m. the Troopers let me go with nothing more than a
warning ticket. I was told that I was being let go because I was
``behaving myself now.'' I complained that my car and baggage were a
mess and Trooper Perry said, ``We ain't good at repacking.'' Trooper
Perry had removed parts of the headliner, floorboards, carpet and other
areas. There was over one thousand dollars of damage.
As soon as we were released, I called Captain Rhodes. He advised me
to go to Fort Sill where the Director of Public Safety searched my
vehicle in case drugs were planted in my car. An Army-certified
narcotic working dog did not find any drugs or contraband.
This experience was very traumatic for Gregory. Throughout the
interrogation, he was frightened and crying. Even before he was removed
from my presence he was nervous, crying and hyperventilating. I had to
watch while my son suffered tremendous physical discomfort from the
heat. Trooper Perry had turned off the air conditioning when he put us
in his car, despite the ninety degree heat.
Before we were finally released, one of the troopers asked who
would come get Gregory if they arrested me. This remark made Gregory
more nervous and upset. He was crying and wondering what would happen
to him and I tried to calm him down. He was scared for the rest of the
trip. My son has since become afraid of dogs. He continues to ask his
mother why his father was treated this way.
I was very humiliated by this experience. I was embarrassed and
ashamed that people driving by would think I had committed a serious
crime. It was particularly horrible to be treated like a criminal in
front of my impressionable young son.
I never thought I would find myself in the position of suing police
officers. I am an authority figure myself. I don't want my son thinking
that this kind of behavior by anyone in uniform is acceptable. I hope
that by coming forward to tell my story it might prevent other people
of color from being treated this way.
Senator Ashcroft. It is my pleasure now to call upon Mr.
Robert Wilkins, who is an attorney from Washington, DC.
Mr. Wilkins, please.
STATEMENT OF ROBERT L. WILKINS
Mr. Wilkins. Thank you, Senator Ashcroft.
Senator Ashcroft. Please pull that in close. We need to be
able to hear you, and for the record we need your voice to be
accurately recorded.
Mr. Wilkins. Thank you, Senator Ashcroft, Ranking Member
Feingold, and Senator Kennedy. It is a great pleasure and honor
for me to be here today and to appear before this distinguished
group on this very important issue, the Traffic Stops
Statistics Study Act.
I am here to tell you a little bit about my own personal
experience and the experience that members of my family and I
unfortunately had to go through back in May 1992.
My grandfather died and, of course, I wanted to go to his
funeral. My uncle lives here in the Washington area. His son,
my first cousin, does as well. And so my uncle, his wife, my
cousin and I decided we would drive to Chicago for the funeral,
and we rented a car to be comfortable for the trip.
On our way driving back, we were stopped in Cumberland, MD,
on Interstate 68. My cousin was driving. Instead of just
writing my cousin a ticket, the trooper took my cousin out of
the car and was questioning him at the rear of the vehicle for
a few minutes. And at some point it became clear to us that
there was something going on, and we found out that the trooper
was trying to get my cousin to sign a consent to search form.
At that point, my uncle and I got out of the car and began
to discuss this matter with the trooper. I identified myself as
an attorney from Washington, DC. I explained to the trooper
that I was actually a public defender, so I was very familiar
with the law of search and seizure and what his rights were and
what our rights were, and that we didn't want to sign any form,
but that if he was placing my cousin under arrest, then
certainly he could do a search of the car incident to that
arrest. But it didn't appear that there were any grounds for
him to be arresting my cousin, so the trooper at that point
said, well, if you have got nothing to hide, then what is your
problem?
I thought this was an extremely troubling response because
asserting your rights and not wanting to be searched
unnecessarily and without reason shouldn't be suspicious. But
for some reason, the trooper didn't take that point of view. He
persisted. He said this was routine, nobody ever objects. We
explained that we couldn't speak for other people and whether
they objected or not, but we certainly didn't want to have to
undergo this search.
Now, mind you, it was raining. It was just around dawn. We
had been driving all night because it had been a very emotional
weekend. My grandmother buried her husband of 58 years, and
there were family members from all over the country, some of
whom I had never met. We tarried much longer than we really
intended to, and as a result we had to drive all night to be
back to our jobs. All of us were working. In fact, I had a
court appearance that morning, and the last thing we wanted was
to be delayed or detained or searched unnecessarily.
None of that seemed to matter to the trooper. He said that
if we weren't going to consent to a search that we would have
to wait for a drug-sniffing dog to be brought to the scene. I
explained to the trooper that that was not legal, that wasn't
proper, and that, in fact, there was a 1985 Supreme Court
decision called United States v. Sharpe that said that he
needed to have reasonable, articulable suspicion to detain us
for this type of a search.
And I asked him what he thought that there could be to
justify this. He said that they had a lot of problems with
rental cars and drugs. It didn't make sense to me because
having a rental car shouldn't be suspicious and I didn't think
that they were stopping every rental car coming up and down the
highway.
At any rate, we were forced to wait for the drug-sniffing
dog and we were forced to stand outside lined up alongside the
road in the rain as the handler and his German shepherd went
over literally every inch of the exterior of our car. The dog
jumped on top of the hood to sniff the area where the
windshield recedes underneath the hood. It jumped onto the side
of the car so that it could sniff the window areas and where
the windows recede down into the door panels, the headlights,
the tail lights, the front grill, underneath the car, the
tires.
And this whole time it was raining. We were lined up there.
There were the police lights flashing from the cars there and
people were driving past looking at us, looking at the dogs,
looking at the police lights, and concluding that we must be
doing something wrong and we must be criminals. Why else would
the police be doing this to us?
And I distinctly remember a car driving past with two young
white children in the back seat, probably about 6 or 7 years
old, with their noses pressed against the window, as kids are
apt to do, looking at us and looking at the police as their
parents or whomever had slowed down as they were driving past.
And I was wondering to myself what kind of miseducation are
they getting about me. I mean, I am not a saint. I haven't
lived a perfect life, as no one has, but I have never used
illegal drugs in my life, in any form, just because I have seen
what they have done to people. And it was greatly offensive to
me to be treated this way.
When we decided to take legal action against the Maryland
State Police after this was over, we learned that they had a
profile that had been drafted actually 2 weeks before we were
stopped that was in writing, and it is attached to my
testimony, that directed their troopers to target young
African-American men and women in rental cars from Virginia
because they believed that they were bringing crack cocaine
into the area.
Well, we fit the profile to a tee. We were in a rental car
from Virginia, and at that time Virginia rental cars had ``R''
as the first letter of their license plate. So the trooper
watching our car drive past could immediately know that this
was a rental car from Virginia. He saw my cousin and I in the
front seat. And when I questioned him, why are we suspicious or
why are you doing this, he said, well, because of the problem
with rental cars and drugs.
So this was going to be the one time where we had a smoking
gun that we could connect to an actual incident, and so we had
a lot of leverage. It didn't hurt, too, to have a lead
plaintiff who was a Harvard Law graduate who had cited a
Supreme Court case to the trooper during the incident. We used
that to negotiate a settlement with the Maryland State Police
which required them to start gathering data and to adopt a non-
discrimination policy and to train their troopers in that
policy. And we would receive that data on a quarterly basis and
look at it and monitor it.
Unfortunately, the data showed a disturbing pattern. Along
I-95, 70 to 75 percent of the people being searched were
African-American, even though when we did studies of who was
driving and who was violating the traffic laws on I-95, it was
only 17 percent African-American.
What was interesting about the data is that we saw that if
you looked at 100 whites being searched and 100 blacks being
searched, they found drugs the exact same number of times. But
for every 100 whites that were searched, 400 blacks were
searched, and so the aggregate numbers were completely
disproportionate. The percentage of people being arrested was
70 to 75 percent African-American, based on these searches
after traffic stops. But you could, with the data, link it back
to the disparity in the law enforcement practices and the
targeting.
That is why we think that the data was so important, and
that is why I think that this bill is so important and I
commend you all for holding this hearing and hopefully
supporting this legislation so that it will pass so that we can
really get the proper data to get behind this problem.
I was taught in Sunday school, and I believe very
seriously, to whom much is given much is required. A lot is
given to our law enforcement officers. They have a lot of
responsibility, and for the most part they exercise that
responsibility very honorably. But it is also required of them,
I think, to have some accountability and to have the public be
able to look at what they are doing so that we can uncover any
problems that need to be uncovered.
Thank you.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you very much, Mr. Wilkins.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Wilkins follows:]
Prepared Statement of Robert L. Wilkins
Chairman Ashcoft, Ranking Member Feingold, Members of the
Committee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to
testify regarding S. 821, ``The Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act Of
1999.'' I believe that I speak for many others all over the country in
thanking and congratulating this Committee for holding hearings on this
very important piece of legislation. Unfortunately, the problem of
``racial profiling'' is a real one. Furthermore, the perception among
many in communities across the nation is that racial profiling results
in unfair and discriminatory treatment in some areas of law
enforcement, particularly in traffic stops. For those reasons, I
strongly believe that these issues deserve further study. Therefore, I
urge you to give Bill S. 821 favorable consideration.
I. THE INCIDENT
Regrettably, I can only speak about racial profiling firsthand,
because I have confronted it face to face.
On May 8, 1982 at approximately 5:55 a.m., myself, my cousin Norman
Scott Wilkins, my uncle (Scott's father) Nu'man El-Amin, and his wife
Aquilah Abdullah were eastbound on I-68 coming through downtown
Cumberland, Maryland. We were returning from my grandfather's funeral
in Chicago. We had left Chicago the previous afternoon and driven all
night, because we were all due back at our jobs; I even had a court
appearance in Washington that morning. Scott was driving; I was in the
front passenger seat, and my uncle and his wife were in the back. I
should also add that myself and my family are African-American, while
all of the police officers involved were white.
Officer V.W. Hughes, from Maryland State Police stopped our car and
told my cousin that he has ``paced him'' doing 60 in a 40 mph zone.
Ofr. Hughes took Scott's license and the rental car contract and
returned to his marked scout car. (The car, a Cadillac, was rented by
my uncle for the trip.) Approximately five minutes later, Hughes
returned and asked Scott to step out of the car. After a brief
discussion between the two of them, Scott leaned toward the car and
said ``Daddy, they want to search the car.''
At that time, Uncle Nu'man and I got out of the car. I politely
explained to Hughes that I was a public defender, and I asked what was
going on. Hughes showed me a ``Consent to Search'' form that he had
asked Scott to sign. Scott had not signed it, and I told Hughes that we
did not consent to him searching anything and that my understanding of
the law was that he could not search our car unless he was arresting
Scott and was making a search incident to that arrest. Hughes informed
me that such searches were routine, that he had never had any problems
before with people refusing consent, and that ``if we had nothing to
hide, then what was the problem.'' I responded we had a right not to be
searched and that this is not a police state. My uncle told him that he
was not going to allow him to search all of our things out there in the
rain. I asked Hughes what justification he had for this request, and he
simply replied that ``he wanted to search the car.'' He also mumbled
something about ``problems with rental cars coming up and down the
highway with drugs.'' I told him that we were coming from the funeral
of my grandfather, the late Rev. G.R. Wilkins, Sr., in Chicago and that
we were driving all night so that I could make a court appearance in
D.C. I told Hughes that if he did not believe me, I would get a copy of
the obituary from the trunk. He responded that ``he did not want to see
any obituary, he wanted to search the car.'' We continued to refuse, so
he informed us that we would have to wait for a narcotics dog to
arrive. We got back inside the car.
At 6:15, about fifteen minutes after we got back into the car, my
uncle and I got out to speak with Hughes. By this time, Officer
Syracuse, another Maryland State trooper, had joined him. My uncle
asked Hughes whether he was going to write Scott a ticket, and he
responded that he was going to give him a warning. My uncle asked him
how much longer for the dog, and Hughes said probably about five more
minutes. My uncle asked him to write the warning now so that we could
be on our way. Hughes refused, stating that we would have to wait for
the dog. I told Hughes that what we was doing was wrong, because the
United States Supreme Court had ruled, in a 1985 decision called United
States versus Sharpe, that he could not detain us for a dog search
unless he had reasonable, articulable suspicion that we were carrying
drugs and that he has no such reasonable suspicion in this case. I also
told that he was supposed to detain us for as brief of a time as
possible, that it had already been at least twenty minutes, and that
the detention was therefore too long. Hughes pretty much ignored my
citation to legal authority and informed me again that this was
``routine,'' that they did it all the time, and that we would just have
to wait.
At 6:26, Sergeant Brown from the Allegheny County Sheriff's
Department came to the car and informed us that he was going to be
taking a dog trained in the detection of narcotics around the car.
Brown told us that we had to step out of the car to the curb. We told
him that we were not getting out of the car, because it was unnecessary
and it was raining. When I ask Brown why we had to get out of the car,
he said that it was procedure and that it was for our safety from the
dog. We informed him that we felt a lot safer inside the car, with his
dog outside. Hughes then told us that if we did not cooperate, ``we
could not get through this.'' Brown took my uncle's driver's license at
that time, and we got out of the car.
The four of us stood outside in the rain while Brown slowly and
thoroughly took his German shepherd around the Cadillac. The dog
sniffed everything, but it never barked or did anything unusual.
Several cars passed us along the highway during this time. When Brown
finished, we were told that we could get back inside the car.
So there we were. Standing outside the car in the rain, lined up
along the road, with police lights flashing, officers standing guard,
and a German Shepherd jumping on top of, underneath, and sniffing every
inch of our vehicle. We were criminal suspects; yet we were just trying
to use the interstate highway to travel from our homes to a funeral. It
is hard to describe the frustration and pain you feel when people
presume you to be guilty for no good reason and you know that you are
innocent. I particularly remember a car driving past with two young
white children in the back seat, noses pressed against the window. They
were looking at the policemen, the flashing lights, the German
Shepherd, and us. In this moment of education that each of us receives
through real world experiences, those children were putting two and two
together and getting five. They saw some black people standing along
the road who certainly must have been bad people who had done something
wrong, for why else would the police have then there? They were getting
an untrue, negative picture of me, and there was nothing in the world
that I could do about it.
A few minutes later, Hughes returned to the care with the two
driver's licenses and a $105 ticket for Scott. At 6:34 a.m., we finally
continued on our way. In addition to the anger, frustration and
embarrassment, the detention caused us to hit the peak of rush hour
traffic on I-270 and the beltway, and I missed my 9:30 court
appearance.
II. THE PROFILE
After such a humiliating and degrading experience, my family and I
were determined to take whatever action we could to ensure that
something like this would never happen to anyone else. We decided to
take legal action, and were fortunate to obtain the services of the
Maryland Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union and the law firm
of Hogan & Hartson. Once we begin the legal process, one of the first
documents we received from the Maryland State Police was the now
infamous ``Criminal Intelligence Report,'' a blatant racial profile.
The Criminal Intelligence Report discussed the crack cocaine
problem in the Cumberland, Maryland area, and recklessly and
indiscriminately advised state troopers that the traffickers ``were
predominately black males and black females'' and that these dangerous
armed traffickers generally traveled early in the morning or late at
night along interstate 68, and that they favored rental cars with
Virginia registration. (Attached as Exhibit 1.) Well, we fit the
profile to a tee. We were traveling on I-68, early in the morning, in a
Virginia rental car. And, my cousin and I, the front seat passengers
were young black males. The only problem was that we were not dangerous
and armed drug traffickers.
It should not be suspicious to travel on I-68, early in the
morning, in a Virginia rental car. And it should not be suspicious to
be black. Yet the Criminal Intelligence Report, which was issued just
two weeks prior to our incident and posted in the barracks to which
these troopers were assigned, encouraged them to believe that they were
justified in stopping and searching us ``because they had problems with
drugs and rental cars,'' as Trooper Hughes related to me on the highway
when I was imploring him for an explanation. These troopers had taken
some information about a small number of individuals and generalized it
to apply to any black person in a rental car. That simply was not
right.
And it wasn't even good police work either. The experts from the
training academy of the Maryland State Police testified in depositions
that profiles do not work well for highway drug interdiction. Drugs are
found in all types of vehicles, driven by people of every race and age,
and in various different circumstances. Thus, the experts testified,
any profile developed would either be too narrow, excluding potential
trafficking situations, or too broad, making nearly everyone a drug
trafficking suspect.
III. THE SETTLEMENT
In January 1995, we settled the lawsuit. (See Exhibit 2.) The
Maryland State Police (MSP) agreed to, among other things:
1. Pay a modest financial settlement of $50,000 in damages to the
four of us who were in the car and $46,000 in attorneys fees for the
three years of legal work done by our lawyers.
2. Prohibit the use of race-based drug courier profiles as a law
enforcement tool. The new MSP policy would ``specifically prohibit
consideration of race as a factor for the development of policies for
stopping, detaining, or searching motorists.''
3. Train all new and previously hired troopers on the contents of
the new policy.
4. Maintain computer records of all traffic stops in which a
consent to search is given by a motorist or a motorist is searched with
a drug-sniffing dog. Information about the date, time, reason for the
stop and race of the people stopped would be collected. This
information would be collected for several years and be forwarded on a
quarterly basis to the federal judge monitoring the lawsuit and us, the
plaintiffs.
5. Discipline troopers who violated the non-discrimination policy
or failed to maintain proper documentation of stops and searches.
6. Remain subject to the jurisdiction of the federal court if the
computer records showed a pattern and practice of discrimination, so
that we, if necessary, could seek further equitable relief.
My family and I, with the help of the ACLU and Swidler, Berlin,
Shereff Freedman, LLP., began to monitor the MSP with the hope that the
suffering we endured would be stopped or minimized by the Settlement.
IV. THE OUTCOME
I wish that I could report a happy ending, but that is not yet
possible. Unfortunately, the MSP data began to show a disturbing trend
immediately, which continued through 1997. During that period, MSP data
showed that 70-75 percent of the people searched on I-95 were African-
American, though African-Americans were only 17% of the drivers on the
highway and only 17 percent of the traffic violators.
The disparities raised serious questions. Initially, the MSP
responded by arguing that since 70-75% of the people who had illegal
drugs or other contraband seized from them were African-American, there
was actually no disparity at all.
But those numbers told only half of the story. Because we had the
more detailed computer records from the Settlement, we learned that:
1. For every 100 blacks searched, and every 100 whites searched,
the number of people found with drugs or contraband was almost exactly
the same. Thus, if you used the practices of the MSP and searched 100
blacks, you would find drugs just as many times as when you searched
100 whites.
2. However, for every 100 whites searched by the MSP, over 400
blacks were searched. This disparity in law enforcement use of traffic
stops and searches was therefore the sole explanation for the fact that
70-75% of the people arrested for drug violations were African-
American.
3. This disparity existed despite a lawsuit, a settlement, new
policies, updated training, and the knowledge that MSP supervisors, the
ACLU and a federal judge were monitoring traffic stops by MSP troopers.
We were therefore forced to seek further court action against the
MSP, because the data showed a serious violation of the Settlement
Agreement. Indeed, we believe that the subsequent events have shown
that while the MSP had issued a policy statement on paper, they had
done little or nothing to enforce it. In addition, a new class action
lawsuit was filed in 1998 on behalf of the Maryland NAACP and minority
motorists who have been targeted for discriminatory stops and searches
on I-95.
Let me hasten to add that this problem is in no way unique to
Maryland. On the contrary, it is a nation-wide problem, and the ACLU
and other organizations have begun, or are developing, race-profiling
litigation in about a half dozen states in addition to Maryland.
Moreover, the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice
in December 1999 entered a comprehensive consent decree with the State
of New Jersey concerning profiling by the State Police there. (And, in
just the last two months, the Justice Department entered a similarly
comprehensive agreement with Montgomery County, Maryland.)
Unfortunately, the limited statistical evidence and anecdotal
information suggest that the problem most likely exists in many States.
Also, it is not a problem with all or even most police officers.
The statistics that the MSP gathered pursuant to the Settlement show
enormous variation among troopers. A relative few singled out
minorities consistently, while most did not, and many troopers seemed
to be even-handed in terms of race. What is more, troopers who are
even-handed seemed equally effective in locating contraband. We are
convinced that effective policing does not require race-targeting,
fairness is not at war with effective law enforcement.
In conclusion, because this is a national problem, a national study
is needed. And while a nationwide study of the issue is not a panacea,
it is a good first step. Only through such a study can we obtain better
knowledge, better understanding, and perhaps better solutions. I
therefore urge you to vote in favor of S. 821.
Thank you.
Senator Ashcroft. It is now my pleasure to call upon Mr.
Curtis Rodriguez, from San Jose, CA.
Mr. Rodriguez, thank you for coming, and you will notice
these lights are designed to coach you as to when your time is
getting short. The yellow comes on, and when the red comes on,
you should think about the next panel.
STATEMENT OF CURTIS V. RODRIGUEZ
Mr. Rodriguez. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, Senator
Feingold, Senator Kennedy. I would like to thank you for the
opportunity to convey to you the reality of racial profiling in
the Latino community, and also for conducting these hearings.
The practice of racial profiling is common knowledge in the
Latino community. It is unfortunately common experience. My
last experience occurred on June 6, 1998. I was traveling with
an associate of mine, Arturo Hernandez. Both of us are criminal
defense attorneys. We were traveling on highway 152, Pacheco
Pass. It is a mountainous, rural area.
As we were driving back into San Jose, we began to observe
a number of stops taking place on Pacheco Pass. The first stop
was of a dark-skinned Latino driver and it appeared that his
vehicle was being searched, which doesn't really surprise us.
We are both familiar with drug interdiction operations and it
seemed fairly normal for that type of operation.
But it wasn't too long afterwards that we ran across a
second traffic stop occurring and it was the same pattern. It
was another Latino driver. His vehicle was also being stopped.
Shortly thereafter, we observed a third stop, the same pattern
of a dark-skinned Latino driver. One of these drivers appeared
to be in the process of moving. He had a pickup truck with a
mattress, box spring, a chest of drawers in the back, and
basically anybody who has ever moved knows that it is a big
hassle. And this guy was outside of his vehicle and the
driver's side door was open and an officer was searching his
vehicle.
Well, at this time Arturo and I basically came to the same
conclusion that it appeared that they were targeting Latinos,
and Latinos only. As we continued westbound on 152, we
encountered a fourth stop in the same pattern, and a fifth
stop. By now, it struck us as very, very strange that with the
percentage of Latinos in California, basically we had run
across five stops, all Latinos, within the space of about 5 to
10 minutes, maybe 15 minutes. And given the length of the stops
where an officer interrogates and does whatever else he does,
they were basically occurring simultaneously. We counted
between 10 and 12 CHP and law enforcement vehicles on Pacheco
Pass, which is usually patrolled by maybe one or two at most.
At that point, of course, I was very intent on just getting
out of there without being stopped. So I made sure my
speedometer was right at the six and five, and made sure that
my vehicle was tracking properly because I didn't want to give
anybody a reason to stop me. Well, that proved to be a failure;
it made no difference. I was pulled over probably a minute
after we observed the last stop.
The CHP unit came upon me in a bend in the freeway, in the
highway there, and he was coming so fast he almost rear-ended
me. Then he kind of pulled back a little bit and followed me
for about 20 to 30 seconds and then pulled me over. When I
asked him why he had stopped me, he indicated to me that my
vehicle had touched the sideline of the lane and that I had
turned my lights on.
Now, on this particular section of the highway it is a
headlight testing area where you are supposed to turn your
headlights on. I believe that is to prevent accidents because
it is a single lane in each direction at that point. So I
indeed had turned my headlights on, but I at no time touched
the sideline of the lane that I was traveling in. So, to me,
that was a fabrication; it was a fiat stop. I said you did
something, so you are being stopped.
At that point, he asked for license, registration,
insurance papers. I produced those for him, and then he
proceeded to ask us if we had any weapons in the vehicle, and I
responded to him, no, we don't have any weapons. His reply was,
well, I am going to search your vehicle for weapons. And at
that point, I objected. I said I don't want you to search my
vehicle for weapons. I am not giving you permission to do so.
And his reply to me was essentially, I don't need your
permission, I am in fear for my personal safety.
At that point, we advised him that he was dealing with two
criminal defense attorneys who were well-versed in criminal
procedure and search and seizure law, to which he basically
responded that he was ordering us out of the vehicle and he
would be conducting a search. But the scope of the search
changed somewhat. Before, he was going to search the vehicle
for weapons; after he found out that we were lawyers, he took
his two index fingers and delineated an area around my
passenger, Arturo Hernandez, and said, I am going to search the
area around your passenger, indicating that he had observed
Arturo to have made suspicious movements.
I found this unbelievable for a number of reasons, the
first being that my vehicle, a 1995 Mazda Millennia, has a
tinted rear windshield and I don't think he saw inside the
traffic compartment. And if he had truly believed that he
feared for his personal safety, I think he would have patted
down Arturo to make sure he didn't have weapons. He never did
that.
He ordered us out of the vehicle and searched that area
around the passenger, after which he ordered us back into the
vehicle, where we sat for about 15, 20 minutes while he and his
associate, an agent with the Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement,
appeared to discuss what was going on. They also had a canine
in the back seat of this patrol unit that they were in. They
took our papers, my license, Arturo's license, and showed it to
the drug-sniffing dog, who did not alert on them in any
fashion. So we were handed these back and sat there and watched
through the sideview mirror these two officers discuss the
matter.
I have watched cops many times, and after an arrest or
during a stop it seems police officers are often in a very good
mood. But these officers were very, very serious; they weren't
laughing, they weren't joking. They were having a very, very
serious discussion, and I have always suspected the reason that
that was so was due to the fact that they were dealing with two
attorneys here and they were trying to figure out the best way
to save face. So after a return to the vehicle, they told us we
could go and that they were sorry for the delay, but the system
was down. I am not sure what exactly that meant, but thereafter
we left.
While talking with this officer, we did question him about
the pattern that we had observed, and his response was a total
non-sequitur. His response was, yesterday I arrested a person
who wasn't a Latino, which was the most vague of denials.
When I was given the opportunity to present my testimony
about this proposed legislation, I would just encourage to make
this legislation as broad as possible and the gathering of
information mandatory, because it occurs to me if only
information gathered is gathered voluntarily that those
officers out there who are involved in racial profiling will
choose not to participate.
I would thank the Senators for their attention, and I would
also thank the National Council of La Raza for their efforts in
making my presence here possible.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Rodriguez follows:]
Prepared Statement of Curtis V. Rodriguez
Mr. Chairman, Senator Feingold and Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for holding this hearing on this very important issue, and
for allowing me to testify.
I am a practicing attorney and member of the California State bar.
I am married and the father of two children, ages 3 and 7. I was raised
in a middle class neighborhood in south San Jose, Santa Clara County in
the San Francisco bay area. I graduated from Santa Clara University
with a Bachelor's degree in history in 1980. I graduated from UCLA
School of Law in 1983. I have been in private practice since that time,
for the majority of that time in solo practice.
I have had the unfortunate experience of having been the victim of
racial profiling conducted by law enforcement agencies throughout my
life.
The first time I was a victim of racial profiling was when I was 17
years old. I was driving my father's Mercedes Benz when two
plainclothes police officers stopped me. They proceeded to interrogate
me for about 10 minutes, asking the name of the owner of the vehicle,
the address, what I was doing with cash, where I was coming from, where
I was going. When I asked them why they stopped me, they said that I
didn't go with the car. Not having yet graduated law school, I did not
know that this was not a legal cause to stop me. I was not under
suspicion of having committed any crime. But because I was not white,
those officers exercised their authority to unlawfully detain me and
question me.
The second time I was a victim of racial profiling was when a
California Highway Patrol (CHP) unit on Highway 152 by the reservoir
stopped me as I was driving home from UCLA with my personal belongings.
I had just completed my first year of law school. This CHP officer did
not cite me for speeding or any other infraction. Neither did he give
me any warnings. He merely pulled me over and proceeded to interrogate
me. He then let me go.
For me, three strikes and you're out applies to racial profiling.
The third time occurred on June 6, 1998. I was driving back from doing
some investigation on a criminal case in the San Joaquin Valley. In the
car with me was Arturo Hernandez, another criminal defense attorney. I
was driving back into Santa Clara valley in the late afternoon.
While on the drive back, we began to notice a large number of law
enforcement vehicles, between 10 and 12 units. We also noticed that it
appeared that only Latinos were being stopped and searched. We observed
3 separate stops being conducted of eastbound vehicles. Each vehicle
had Latino occupants who were being stopped and searched.
We then observed two more stops of westbound traffic. The same
pattern asserted itself. Again Latinos were being pulled over and
searched.
Not wanting to be one of the unlucky people who were getting pulled
over, I made sure that I was not exceeding the speed limit and that my
vehicle was tracking properly. However, my efforts failed.
Shortly after observing this fifth stop, I was pulled over by a CHP
unit with a CHP officer and a Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement (BNE)
officer inside. The CHP officer told me that I had turned on my lights
and had touched the line marking the side of the lane. I had turned on
my lights but on that stretch of highway 152 it was required. I did not
touch or cross over the side line as the officer asserted.
The CHP officer then proceeded to ask if we had any weapons in the
vehicle. I responded that we did not. He then told me that he was going
to search the vehicle. I objected to this stating that I was not giving
him my permission to search. He responded that he did not need any
permission as he was in fear for his personal safety. At that point, we
advised him that we were lawyers and that he was essentially ordering
us from the vehicle. He agreed and ordered us from the vehicle. But he
changed the scope of his search saying that he would be searching only
the area around my passenger, outlining the area with his two index
fingers. He then searched. Afterwards he permitted us to return to the
vehicle and had a long discussion with his BNE associate.
While we were stopped, he took my driver's license, my passenger's
driver's license, my registration, and other papers and took them back
to his patrol vehicle. He then showed them to the occupant of the rear
of his unit, a canine. It was clearly a drug-sniffing dog.
We were detained for about 20 minutes and then released with no
ticket, no warning, and only a vague apology about the delay, claiming
some technical snafu was responsible.
What occurred that day was an outrage and an offense to every
person who believes in equal treatment under the law. Every stop I
witnessed that afternoon on Pacheco Pass was of Latinos. They appeared
to be the only ethnic group that was targeted for stops and searches. I
believe that such practices have gone on long enough and that it is
time for such practices to stop.
I have since filed an action in federal court to put an end to such
racist and illegal practices. As far as I know, no such legal challenge
has been raised in the civil context because the only ones raising the
issues are criminal defendants. I do support any legislation, such as
the ``Traffic Stops Statistics Act'' sponsored by Senator Feingold,
that would assist in the gathering of information concerning racial
profiling and would encourage such legislation so that the scope of the
problem can be fully measured.
This action is not a case of minorities against the police. This is
an action about the equal treatment of all people. This is about law
abiding citizens who believe in the Constitution, who believe in equal
protection, taking a stand against a small clique within the legal
community who believe it is okay to target people on the basis of their
skin color.
Please understand that I have no bias against law enforcement. I
have close friends and relatives who are deputy sheriffs, San Jose
Police Officers and even agents in the DEA. These are people whom I
would trust with my life. These are good, honest, hardworking people
like the majority of law enforcement officers. Unfortunately, there are
others within law enforcement who insist on conducting racially based
methods of operation or who insist on making stops on the basis of race
and conducting illegal searches on the same basis. These people
undermine the confidence that the community has that their law
enforcement agencies will match their conduct to the requirements of
the law they are supposed to enforce.
Senator Ashcroft. It is our practice now to have some
questions from the members of the subcommittee, and I would
turn first to the ranking member.
Senator Feingold. With your permission, Mr. Chairman,
Senator Kennedy needs to get to a hearing on the patient's bill
of rights. I would love it if we could let him go ahead of me.
Senator Ashcroft. Without objection.
Senator Kennedy. Thank you.
Sergeant, I understand you were in the service for 17
years. Is that right?
Sergeant Gerald. Eighteen years now, sir.
Senator Kennedy. Eighteen years?
Sergeant Gerald. Yes, sir, 18 years now.
Senator Kennedy. And you have received meritorious
citations, have you?
Sergeant Gerald. Yes, sir. The highest award I have is the
Bronze Star, sir.
Senator Kennedy. And as you mentioned, you have served in
Somalia?
Sergeant Gerald. Somalia and the Gulf War, sir.
Senator Kennedy. How long were you in Somalia?
Sergeant Gerald. In Somalia, at least 4 months, sir.
Senator Kennedy. Four months?
Sergeant Gerald. Four to 5 months, sir.
Senator Kennedy. And in the Gulf War for how long?
Sergeant Gerald. For the entire 6 months, sir.
Senator Kennedy. Now, you are in a continuing education
program?
Sergeant Gerald. Yes, sir. I graduated from the University
of Maryland last semester with a business marketing degree.
Right now, I am working on my graduate program through Towson
State University on my M.B.A. As a matter of fact, I have got a
class tomorrow night and Saturday morning.
Senator Kennedy. I guess you were trained earlier to
perform what function in the military?
Sergeant Gerald. Well, I am a logistician, and like I said
before, my company commander--we do health and welfare
inspections of our troops, and the MPI, the CID and military
police----
Senator Kennedy. Is that competitive in order to get
selected for that responsibility?
Sergeant Gerald. Well, what it is, sir, is a company
commander will request for assistance from his logisticians
because we are in charge of the billets, and so forth, and the
property that belongs to the company commander, sir. And it
shows how the dogs react when they are looking for contraband
and narcotics, sir.
Senator Kennedy. As I understand it, just from your own
record, you haven't had any problems with the law.
Sergeant Gerald. No, sir. As a matter of fact, when they
stopped me, they were kind of confused. They couldn't find any
traffic tickets or any outstanding warrants at all for both
identifications, sir.
Senator Kennedy. Well, it shouldn't happen to anyone what
happened to you, but here is an example of someone who is in
the service of the country and has been someone whose record in
the military is exemplary, has been selected for important
responsibilities, and certainly by disposition and nature and
bearing is someone whom the country has to be proud of.
Sergeant Gerald. Thank you, sir.
Senator Kennedy. And this kind of humiliation and activity,
I think, is just an enormous disservice. And we hope you will
extend that to your son.
Sergeant Gerald. Yes, sir.
Senator Kennedy. Let me just ask our final two witnesses,
Mr. Chairman, there will be those who will say, well, you could
go out there and find these two witnesses; you know, we are a
big country and a lot of things happen. Since you have
experienced the incidents that you did, have you found out that
this is something that is happening out there in the real
world?
I mean, will there be those who will watch these hearings
and say, look, you have got three people there and it has
happened, but it really isn't a problem in the United States
today, and they just happened to get the wrong people and they
came forward and have been willing to challenge the system?
How would you respond or react to whether this is something
that we as a society ought to be willing to face up to, because
basically that is what we are talking about with the
legislation? We have got to be able to say that this is
something of concern to all Americans. Could you help me out on
that, each of you, please?
Mr. Wilkins. Well, Senator Kennedy, I can speak most
directly and personally about Maryland because we have been
gathering data there since 1995 now. You know, there is really
no way that I see that you can dispute what that data shows
that there are scores of people who are stopped. And when you
look at the reasons for why they were stopped and searched, you
know, nervous, just really no articulable manners or anything
that was suspicious at all.
And there is this huge disparity and there is really no way
that it can be explained. Unfortunately, because of the
continuing problems in Maryland--and think about it, we settled
the case in 1995. All the troopers went through new training.
They knew that these reports were being done. They knew that
they were being sent to a Federal judge, they knew that they
were being sent to the ACLU, and we still had all of these
disparities in Maryland over the course of the years after the
settlement. And so I think that the only thing you could
conclude from that is it is a huge problem.
Senator Kennedy. Mr. Rodriguez.
Mr. Rodriguez. Yes. Senator Kennedy, I do believe that the
problem is widespread. While I don't have any particular
information, statistical studies, from California, we are in
the process of gathering that now. But from my own experience
and just speaking with the large extended family that I have--
we are talking about 12, 13 sets of aunts and uncles and
cousins that I have. I have an uncle who worked at IBM and
drove a Porsche, and although I am sure some of those stops
were because he might have been driving a little too fast, a
number of those stops were very close to his own home, for no
particular reason.
I can speak to the experience of some of my younger cousins
who will tell me that they were stopped for no reason. They
were searched and they were hassled by police officers or
highway patrolmen. So this is something, as I said, that is a
very common experience in the Latino community and is something
that we are very concerned about. And I think the reason that
there are not more people available is that the reality at
least in law enforcement is that you have two classes of people
who get stopped.
The one class of people who are doing nothing and are
completely innocent of any infraction are let go or given some
minor ticket, and they would just as soon forget the whole
matter. The other class of people are the ones that get caught
with dope, with narcotics, and they go into court and they say,
hey, these guys were targeting Latinos. But it becomes a
question of credibility as to whether you believe the law
enforcement agent or you believe the narcotics trafficker.
Either way, I believe that is what has contributed to
permitting this type of practice to go on for so long and to be
unchallenged for so long.
Senator Kennedy. Thank you. I want to thank our witnesses
for very powerful, powerful testimony.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you.
Senator Feingold.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to also
thank all the witnesses on this panel for your extraordinary
testimony. It can't be very easy for you to talk about these
experiences. If something like this happened to me or a member
of my family, I suppose I would want to erase it from my
memory.
But you are doing a great service to your community and to
the country by speaking about it openly. Only by shining a
spotlight on this horrible problem can we build the political
consensus necessary to do something about it. And I assure you,
I don't think there is anybody who could listen to what you
have said who wouldn't be disgusted by the events you describe.
So I would like to focus for a minute on one aspect of what
I call the ripple effect of racial profiling that I find
particularly saddening, even chilling, and that is the effect
on children and young people. There can't be any doubt that
this kind of experience can scar a young person permanently. I
have also heard many times from parents in minority communities
that they feel compelled to educate and warn their youngsters
about the possibility that they will be stopped for no reason,
and instruct them on how to behave to avoid escalating the
situation.
I have had a lot of difficult conversations with my sons
and daughter, but I have never had to warn them that there is a
good chance they are going to be stopped and harassed by police
officers. So as a parent, it makes me enormously sad to hear
that this kind of conversation has to take place in many
families.
I wonder if each of you could comment briefly on the impact
that racial profiling has on young people, either with regard
to your own experience or that that you have heard from others.
I would start with Mr. Rodriguez.
Mr. Rodriguez. Yes, thank you. For my part, my children are
fairly young. They are 3 and 7 years old, and we haven't really
gotten to the point where they are in any position where they
would experience this kind of encounter. However, I do believe
it is necessary that they understand that for the most part
people in law enforcement are hard-working, honest people, but
there will always be an element, or at least there is presently
an element that will conduct their activities on the basis of
race.
Fortunately, I have a sister who is a deputy sheriff, I
have a cousin who works in the DEA, and so these are positive
role models for them. But I do have to make them aware that,
yes, you have to be aware that there may come some point where
you will be stopped by an officer based upon your race. And
your only options out there on the street are to obey the
officer, do what he tells you, because failure to do so could
lead to your being arrested or even being hurt in some fashion.
And that is, of course, always a danger. If you are dealing
with officers who take it upon themselves to deal with you on a
racial basis, you have the possibility that it could escalate
into something violent. And I believe what has happened in the
past is when those incidents do escalate into violence, usually
it is violence committed by the law enforcement officer against
the victim of the racial profiling.
I don't think I have heard of an incident yet where one of
these people has taken to attacking a police officer. And that
is fortunate, but that is not something we should really have
to worry about or have to deal with in our everyday lives. We
are not looking for special treatment. We just wanted to be
treated like everybody else, and if I am driving 85 miles an
hour down Highway 5, I should be stopped and I should be
ticketed. And if I do that and I get ticketed, I deserve what I
get. But I don't expect to be driving down the street and get
stopped and interrogated because they tell me I don't look like
I go with my car.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, Mr. Rodriguez.
Mr. Wilkins.
Mr. Wilkins. Well, my son is only 17 months old and I hope
that I never have to have this conversation with him, but
unfortunately I probably will at some point. From the young
people that I talk to, I think that this is very corrosive.
Just the perception that it exists is very corrosive, and in
reality when incidents do happen and people talk about them and
the word spreads, it just really feeds on that and causes
people unnecessarily to look at all police officers or the
whole judicial system or the whole legal system askance, you
know, with disrespect or suspicion.
And that is not good, and it is very scary when I look back
at the written profile that the State of Maryland had that led
to our stop, it really set up a dangerous situation by talking
about how these were armed traffickers. There was even a line
in there where it was said they are quoted as saying they won't
even hesitate to kill a police officer, if necessary. And I was
lumped in with these people, my family and I, in the mind of
this trooper who dealt with us.
I will have to make sure that my son someday understands
that that can happen, that no matter what he does or no matter
what is in his mind, if he were to object or to speak out with
a police officer and might not intend to follow that up with
violence, they may have a whole different perception. So he
should be very careful in how he interacts in any situations
like that.
Senator Feingold. Master Sergeant Gerald, it was the
testimony about your son that sort of led to this question, so
I am curious about your response.
Sergeant Gerald. Senator, I spoke to my son about this the
day it happened. I was trying to keep a positive about
everything, no matter what happened to me, and I spoke to my
son about this. He is 14 right now. He was 12 back then when it
happened. I explained to him I am an authority figure myself. I
took an oath to protect the Constitution and defend this
country against foreign and domestic enemies.
And I told my son that I don't want you to stereotype law
enforcement agencies because we only have a few bad apples who
are doing this in the system. And he knows from my point of
view and from his point of view that these officers that did
this heinous crime were breaking the law, breaking the rules
and regulations. That is why I explained to him that we need to
do something about this as parents, as citizens, just to pass
some kind of bill or law to monitor this kind of stuff.
He really believes that the incident that happened out
there in Oklahoma was an incident that shouldn't have happened
for his future and for the other kids' futures. And I am glad
that he went on the program a couple of weeks back because he
was holding this inside for the longest time, and you just
don't know how he feels now about it knowing that people are
hearing his story.
I am just glad to be here to express my feelings as a
parent. But I just try and teach my son the right thing to do,
and I think the right thing to do for us as citizens is to make
sure this doesn't happen again.
Senator Feingold. I hope you tell him that he is only 14
years old, but he has already helped pass a law a lot earlier
than I ever did.
Sergeant Gerald. Thank you, sir.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Ashcroft. Let me, first of all, thank each of you
for coming. I think this is a story that needs to be told and
needs to be understood, and you each bring a unique perspective
to this, so thank you very much.
Master Sergeant Gerald, I wasn't clear. Did they alter your
car? Did you say they drilled holes in your car?
Sergeant Gerald. Yes, sir. As a matter of fact, the
passenger side seat or floor board--he cut open the carpet to
get to the floor board. So before he could drill into the floor
board, he had to cut the carpet, take it apart, drill into the
floor board. And after he drilled into the floor board, what
really he did is he came to me, to my son and I--and since I am
a logistician and I am in charge of property for the U.S. Army,
he came to me and told me that I had military bolts in the
floor board, which meant I had a secret compartment.
Well, there is no such thing as military bolts in the Army,
and I explained that to the officer. I order property for the
Army and there is no such thing as that. But he still insisted
that I had a secret compartment. So I explained to him that he
needed to call my commander, and he didn't.
Senator Ashcroft. Was anything ever done to repair or
otherwise----
Sergeant Gerald. No, sir. Everything that could not be
taken apart with a drill, he tore it apart. My car is a two-
seater car, and anything that could not be taken apart, he tore
it apart. I mean, he ripped it apart completely. In the back of
the hatchback, some of the panel was just dangling there. The
carpet was ripped up. Everything in the back under the trunk
was ripped apart, and so forth.
He laid everything on the ground. I asked him politely to
put the floor board back, and at that point he said I called
the officer a boy. And I said, no, I did not call the officer a
boy; I asked if you are going to put the floor board back the
way you found it. And then he kept saying, did you call Officer
Perry a boy, in front of my son? And I said, no, I didn't, sir;
I am asking if you are going to put everything back the way you
found it.
So the intimidation factor was still there and he made sure
that he made an example of me by destroying most of my
property. And what I did after that is I just called GEICO. I
had to pay the bill myself. I made sure that my vehicle was
back up to standards, sir, because I am going to pass that
vehicle to my son and he knows that.
Senator Ashcroft. So there was about $1,000 of damage, you
said?
Sergeant Gerald. Yes, sir; yes, sir. I took it straight to
GEICO----
Senator Ashcroft. Not counting the damage to your son?
Sergeant Gerald. The emotional damage to my son and I is
uncountable, sir. There is no measure for that, sir.
Senator Ashcroft. Now, Mr. Wilkins has followed up and has
an opportunity to sort of shape what happens in some respect by
gathering data. Are you aware of anything that has happened as
a result of your situation to change the operations in the
settings where you were stopped, Mr. Rodriguez and Master
Sergeant Gerald?
Mr. Rodriguez. Mr. Chairman, I did file an action in
Federal court last June and we are presently in the discovery
stage of the litigation. We are also, as I said, in the process
of gathering statistics, very, very interested, of course, in
the records created and kept by the California Highway Patrol
for the events of June 6. And basically we are seeking
injunctive relief, first and foremost, to prevent the conduct
of such operations in the future, but it will be a while still
before we have an outcome.
Senator Ashcroft. Master Sergeant Gerald, are you aware
whether the situation and the situation in which you found
yourself has occasioned any change in behavior or development
of data or the like?
Sergeant Gerald. Yes, I have. I have my lawyer representing
me and has information dealing with that, sir, and he has all
the facts, sir.
Senator Ashcroft. Well, we have another panel and I want to
personally thank you.
We will take about a 6- or 8-minute break and then we will
start with the next panel. I again want to, on behalf of the
other Senators who are here today, thank you for coming and
sharing your circumstances with us. Thank you.
Mr. Rodriguez. You are very welcome.
Mr. Wilkins. Thank you.
Sergeant Gerald. Thank you, sir.
[The subcommittee was recessed from 3:24 p.m. to 3:31 p.m.]
Senator Ashcroft. Ladies and gentlemen, if we could
reconvene the hearing, we have five more witnesses. We really
have until about 4 p.m., and there are other pressing
responsibilities, unless something happens with a vote and then
we will be in a problem.
I would like to call the remaining witnesses--Professor
Harris, Mr. Johnny Hughes, Mr. John Welter, Mr. Rodney Watt,
and the Honorable Leroy Jones--to the witness area and see if
we can resume the hearing.
Let me say to you that I would hope that you can try and
confine your remarks to 5 minutes. I think we are going to have
to be a little stricter on that than we have been, and I beg
your pardon for running over a little with the first panel.
But with that in mind, I want to also mention that we
sought to have a number of folks available for contribution
today who were unable to come. The Fraternal Order of Police,
the International Association of Chiefs of Police, and other
organizations that have expressed their opposition to the
legislation were, due to scheduling difficulties, unable to
attend. We have invited them to submit written testimony to
ensure that all views on the legislation are fully represented,
and we will keep the record open in order to accommodate them
and any of you. If you are like me, I am driving away from the
place and say, oh, I should have said this or that. We want you
to have an opportunity for the next few days in order to submit
testimony.
With us today are Professor David Harris, Professor of Law
at the University of Toledo College of Law, who has authored a
report on this subject; Trooper Johnny Hughes, Director of
Governmental Affairs for the National Troopers Coalition;
Assistant Chief of Police John Welter from the San Diego Police
Department; Officer Rodney Watt from the Highland Park Police
Department, in Illinois; and the Honorable Leroy Jones, Jr., a
New Jersey State Assemblyman.
With that in mind, I would like to ask you to begin your
testimony, Professor Harris.
PANEL CONSISTING OF DAVID HARRIS, BALK PROFESSOR OF LAW AND
VALUES, UNIVERSITY OF TOLEDO COLLEGE OF LAW, TOLEDO, OH; JOHNNY
L. HUGHES, NATIONAL TROOPERS COALITION, ANNAPOLIS, MD; JOHN
WELTER, ASSISTANT CHIEF OF POLICE, SAN DIEGO, CA; RODNEY WATT,
PATROL OFFICER, HIGHLAND PARK, IL; AND HON. LEROY T. JONES,
JR., STATE ASSEMBLYMAN, STATE OF NEW JERSEY
STATEMENT OF DAVID HARRIS
Mr. Harris. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Feingold,
distinguished ladies and gentlemen. I thank you very, very much
for holding this hearing and for inviting me to participate. I
found your remarks at the beginning of the hearing strong and I
applaud them greatly. I think that the changes that you look
for in the bill are things that can strengthen it and make it a
good piece of legislation, and I look forward to working with
anybody on the committee to advance an important bill like
this, S. 821.
I want to spend my few minutes with you going to what I
believe is the core of the issue here. You heard in the last
panel from three gentlemen who had experienced racial profiling
on a very personal level. We know that it is angering, we know
that it is humiliating, we know that it can even be physically
dangerous. And on the individual level, it causes a cynicism
that eats into the fabric of our institutions and that has us
all in its power because we all depend on the legitimacy of our
police and our courts in order that our civil society be the
great country that it is.
But it goes beyond the individual level, too. This practice
of racial profiling is important because it is a window, if you
will, a manifestation of all of the most difficult and
intractable issues that we face now as a country where race and
criminal justice come together.
If we can begin the process today of coming to grips with
racial profiling and beginning to understand it, we can also
begin to understand some of the other very difficult problems
of race and criminal justice that we have, such as the fact
that our prison populations are disproportionately minority,
such as the fact that stereotypes pervade not just our civil
life but law enforcement, too. All of those can begin with this
bill today.
This bill--I agree with Senator Kennedy--is a modest bill
indeed. But every long journey begins with a first step, and
this can be the first step along the path to understanding this
practice and to making progress on these critical issues
altogether.
Let me make one point. The rest of my points I will leave
for my written remarks which I ask be incorporated into the
record. The one point I want to make here today is to echo
Senator Feingold's comment earlier. Racial profiling is not
good law enforcement. It is bad law enforcement, for a host of
reasons, but let me give you a few.
When I speak to groups, as I do, police groups, groups of
all kinds of people, what I often hear is that racial profiling
is a rational response to arrest statistics, that it is simply
an unintended consequence of rational law enforcement policy
because arrest statistics show that blacks and Latinos are
disproportionately arrested and disproportionately involved
with drugs. These arrest statistics are what is used to justify
this practice.
Well, I want to tell you today that that is wrong on the
facts. The inferences drawn from it are wrong. It exposes this
reasoning as the creature of stereotypes, and I believe it is
nothing in the end but a self-fulfilling prophecy. Let me
explain.
Is it true that arrest statistics are higher for blacks and
Latinos for drug crimes? Yes, it is true, but we have to think
carefully about what that means. Arrest statistics for drugs
are not like statistics for arrests for other crimes. Arrest
statistics for drugs don't measure the incidence of those
crimes; they measure law enforcement activity itself.
There may be very good reasons why we decide to make drug
arrests here rather than there, why we decide to deploy
officers here rather than there. But what those arrest
statistics measure are those policy decisions, those decisions
on who we go after. Arrest statistics do not measure who is
involved with drugs as users or who is involved with drugs as
traffickers, and we do have some good information about those
two things.
There are 30 years of statistics on who is using drugs, at
what rate, in what age groups, and so forth. And overall, over
time, those statistics show very clearly that blacks do not use
drugs in numbers that are out of proportion to their presence
in the population. They are roughly 12 percent of the
population and roughly 13 percent of the drug users.
We also have numbers on drug trafficking. We get some of
that from Mr. Wilkins' Maryland statistics where, as he has
told you, the hit rates, the rates at which contraband is found
in the cars of those who are searched, are the same for blacks
and whites, statistically indistinguishable, belying the
stereotypes.
We also have data for the Customs Service. The Customs
Service is the agency that searches people when they come into
airports who might be suspected of carrying drugs. They use
intrusive search techniques of one type or another ranging from
pat-downs to body searches, and what those statistics show us
is really stark: the hit rates for whites, 6.8 percent; hit
rates for blacks, 6.2 percent; the hit rates for Latinos, 2.8
percent--in other words, exactly the reverse of what the
stereotypes would tell us.
Well, what is the upshot here? The upshot is this: 12
percent of the population, 13 percent of the drug users, yet
blacks are 38 percent of all those arrested for drug crimes.
That is why I say the arrest statistics measure law
enforcement. Blacks are more likely to go to prison for drug
crimes and they go for longer sentences. So the effect of
racial profiling may be on the front end of the system, but it
reverberates all the way through into the prisons.
Now, why is this really bad law enforcement beyond what I
have already told you? Because at the same time that we are
paying too much attention to blacks and Latinos, white people
are getting a free pass. The white traffickers and users are
getting less attention than their numbers in the population
would suggest. That is why I say it is a self-fulfilling
prophecy.
What this committee can do as a first step is to bring this
legislation forward to begin the process of addressing this
problem through collecting solid data that will tell us about
the scope of the problem, the depth of the problem, and then we
will have the information we need to make the correct policy
decisions.
Thank you very much.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you, Professor Harris.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Harris follows:]
Prepared Statement of David A. Harris
Good morning, distinguished ladies and gentleman. My subject this
morning could not be more timely or--unfortunately--more familiar. I am
here today to talk about racial profiling: the use of traffic offenses
as an excuse--a pretext--to stop, question and search African-American
and other minority drivers in numbers far out of proportion to their
presence on the road. Police use this practice because there are
officers who believe that having black or brown skin is an indication
of a greater risk of criminality, and they therefore view all
minorities as potential criminals. Skin color becomes evidence; the
upshot is that all African-Americans and Hispanics become suspects
every time they engage in the most common and prototypically American
act: driving. Law enforcement officials try to explain profiling away
as a rational response to crime, or as an efficient approach to
policing. But the down and dirty of profiling is this: skin color used
as evidence against thousands of innocent people every day.
African-Americans, Hispanics, and other minorities have complained
about this police practice for years. Yet some still deny that it
happens, in the face of strong statistical evidence to the contrary. In
New Jersey, a rigorous statistical study showed that race was the only
variable that could explain which drivers were stopped by the New
Jersey State Police. The statistician who performed the analysis
described these numbers as ``literally off the charts'' in terms of
their statistical significance. In April of 1999, after five years of
bitter struggle, New Jersey officials from Governor Whitman on down
finally admitted what had long been obvious to people of color:
troopers were engaged in profiling on the Turnpike. In Maryland,
statistics turned over to a federal court by the Maryland State Police
after the settlement of a major public civil rights lawsuit challenging
profiling showed that on Interstate 95, where 17 percent of the drivers
were black, more than 75 percent of those stopped and searched were
black. In my own study of four cities in Ohio, completed just last
year, police were roughly twice as likely to ticket black drivers as
they were to ticket nonblack drivers. When lower vehicle ownership by
blacks was factored in, the ratio rose to two and a half to three times
as likely. The Ohio results dovetail with the results of ticketing
studies in Texas, North Carolina, and other states.
The Traffic Stops Statistics Act, S.B. 821, can be the beginning of
a serious discussion, and perhaps a resolution, of these issues. That
bill, the first of its kind, proposes a study that would include the
collection of statistics on all routine traffic stops in a national
sample of jurisdictions. It would give us the first chance to get a
firm and comprehensive grip on the scope and scale of the problem known
to many as ``driving while black.'' The idea behind the bill is to take
a first step on the road toward addressing these practices by gathering
the necessary evidence to lay the denials to rest once and for all.
With data collection of all kinds becoming a standard practice in many
aspects of law enforcement (New York's ``COMPSTAT'' program for mapping
crime comes to mind), it seems odd that as of the beginning of last
year, no state or major city had any mechanism in place for systematic
collection of data on all traffic stops, a key law enforcement tactic
that had been used for years. There were no numbers collected anywhere
that would allow one to see the patterns of which drivers were stopped,
how often, and for what. I argued in an article I published in 1997
that I had the privilege of presenting to the Congressional Black
Caucus that legislation should require the collection of such
statistics. S.B. 821, the bill we are here to discuss today, does just
that. S.B. 821 requires participating police departments to collect
comprehensive statistics for each and every routine traffic stop.
Police would collect crucial data for analysis--age, race, and
ethnicity of the driver, the reason for the stop, whether or not a
search was conducted, the legal rationale for the search, whether any
contraband was found, and what it was. The Justice Department would
perform an initial analysis on currently available data within 120 days
of the bill's passage; after two years of data collection, the
Department would issue a comprehensive report containing a study of all
the information collected.
state and local data collection legislative proposals and initiatives
The Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act has already had an
important, perhaps unforeseen impact, beyond the Congress. The bill has
inspired a host of similar measures at the state level. It has also
become the catalyst and the template for data collection by local law
enforcement agencies all across the country. These include police
departments in Houston, San Diego, San Jose, Salt Lake City, San
Francisco, and more than a hundred other municipalities, as well as
state police departments in Florida, Washington State, Michigan, and
other states. This past April, North Carolina became the first state to
pass a bill requiring data collection. The head of the North Carolina
Highway Patrol, Colonel Richard Holden, has said that he was glad to
support this effort because, quite simply, ``it was the right thing to
do.'' In June, Connecticut became the second state to pass such a law.
It is even more comprehensive than North Carolina's, since it covers
every police agency in the state. (North Carolina's legislation applies
only to stops by the Highway Patrol.) In just the last twelve months,
the number of state legislative proposals to begin data collection on
traffic stops grew from just a few to twenty, with new efforts
sprouting all the time. There are now or have been bills pending in,
among other states, California, Pennsylvania, Washington State, Utah,
Missouri, Massachusetts, South Carolina, Illinois, Florida, Ohio,
Maryland, New Jersey, Virginia, Rhode Island, and Oklahoma. Almost all
of these bills are variations on the theme of comprehensive data
collection first put forth in the Conyers bill. Most are customized, in
some sense, to their individual states.
These actions and initiative manifest a real desire to begin
correcting what people of color everywhere know to be a long-standing
problem in their relationship with police and the entire criminal
justice system. Bills requiring data collection (and, in the case of
Connecticut, requiring anti-profiling policies) have become the way to
focus this energy and begin the long journey toward addressing this
civil rights issue on the state level.
SIX REASONS THAT COMING TO GRIPS WITH RACIAL PROFILING IS IN THE
INTEREST OF LAW ENFORCEMENT
It is easy to understand why those immediately affected by
profiling would want the country to confront the problem and root it
out. It is an experience that produces fear, anger, humiliation, and
can at times be physically dangerous. Perhaps less well understood is
the fact that law enforcement itself has a huge stake in coming to
grips with the problem. Simply put, police officers and law enforcement
agencies have a tremendous amount to lose if profiling continues.
Conversely, they have much to gain by addressing the problem
forthrightly and directly.
1. Profiling as Poor Policing: The Rational Discrimination Argument
When one hears the most common justification offered for the making
of disproportionate numbers of traffic stops of African-Americans, it
usually takes the form not of racism, but of rationality. Blacks commit
a disproportionate share of certain crimes, the argument goes.
Therefore, it only makes sense for police to focus their efforts on
African-Americans. As a spokesman for the Maryland State Police said,
this isn't racism--it is ``the unfortunate byproduct of sound police
policies.'' It only makes sense to focus law enforcement efforts and
resources where they will make the most difference. In other words,
targeting blacks is the rational, sound policy choice; it is the
efficient approach as well.
This argument may sound appealing, but it ultimately fails. First,
its underlying premise is wrong. Government statistics on arrests for
drug crime (and drug crimes, not other offenses, are what the great
majority of pretext traffic stops are about) tell us virtually nothing
about the racial breakdown of those involved in drug crime. Think for a
moment about arrest data in general. These statistics show that blacks
are indeed over represented among those arrested for homicide, rape,
robbery, aggravated assault, larceny/theft, and simple assault crimes.
Note that all of these crimes are at least somewhat likely (much more
likely in the case of homicide, less likely in the case of rape) to be
reported to police and may then result in arrest; these crimes have
victims, people directly affected by the crimes, who may do the
reporting. By contrast, drug offenses are much less likely to be
reported, since possessors, buyers, and sellers of narcotics are all
willing participants in these crimes. This makes arrest data for drug
crimes highly suspect. These data do not measure the extent of drug
crimes. Rather, they measure law enforcement activity and the policy
choices of many of the institutions and actors involved in the criminal
justice system. Similarly, looking at the racial composition of prison
and jail populations or the racial breakdown of sentences for these
crimes only measures the actions of those who run our penal
institutions and the officials who put together our criminal law and
sentencing systems.
In point of fact, statistics on both drug use and drug crime belie
the usual stereotypes: blacks may not, in fact, be more likely than
whites to be involved with drugs. John Lamberth's study of traffic
stops and searches in Maryland showed that among vehicles stopped and
searched, the ``hit rates''--the percentage of vehicles searched in
which drugs were found--were statistically indistinguishable for blacks
and whites. In a related situation, the U.S. Customs Service, which is
engaged in drug interdiction efforts at the nation's airports, has used
various types of invasive searches from pat downs to body cavity
searches against travelers suspected of drug smuggling. The Custom
Service's own nationwide figures show that while over forty-three
percent of those subjected to these searches were either black or
Hispanic, ``hit rates'' for these searches were actually lower for both
blacks and Hispanics than for whites--6.7 percent for whites, 6.3
percent for blacks, and 2.8 percent for Hispanics. Similarly, it has
long been established that most drug users are white, and that most
users buy their drugs from people of their own race. This throws even
more doubt on the usual stereotype of the drug dealer as a black or
Latino.
We find the same counter stereotypical information when we look at
data on drug use. The percentage of drug users among blacks and whites
is roughly the same as the presence of those groups in the population
as a whole. For example, blacks are roughly twelve percent of the
population of the country; in 1997, the most recent year for which
statistics are available, thirteen percent of all drug users were
black. In fact, among black youths--a demographic group often portrayed
as most likely to be involved with drugs--there is evidence that use of
all illicit substances has actually been consistently lower than among
white youths for twenty years running.
Nevetheless, many continue to believe that African-Americans and
members of other minority groups are responsible for most drug use and
drug trafficking. Carl Williams, the head of the New Jersey State
Police dismissed by the Governor in March of 1999, stated that ``mostly
minorities'' trafficked in marijuana and cocaine, and pointed out that
when senior American officials went overseas to discuss the drug
problem, they went to Mexico, not Ireland. Even if he is wrong, if
Williams and the many troopers who worked for him share these opinions,
they will likely act accordingly. And they will do so by looking for
drug criminals among black drivers. Blackness will become an indicator
of suspicion of drug crime involvement. This, in turn, means that the
belief that blacks are disproportionately involved in drug crimes will
become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Because police will look for drug
crime among black drivers, they will find it disproportionately among
black drivers. This will means more blacks arrested, prosecuted,
convicted, and jailed, which of course will reinforce the idea that
blacks are disproportionately involved in drug crimes, resulting in a
continuing motive and justification for stopping more black drivers as
a rational way of using resources to catch the most criminals. At the
same time, of course--and this may be the worst part of rational
discrimination from a pure law enforcement point of view--because
police focus on black drivers, white drivers will receive less
attention than they otherwise might, and the drug dealers and
possessors among them will be apprehended in proportionately smaller
numbers than their presence in the population would predict. In other
words, rational discrimination will result in white drug dealers and
possessors escaping prosecution in huge numbers, even as
disproportionately high numbers of blacks are stopped and searched.
The upshot of this thinking is visible in the stark numbers that
show what our criminal justice system does when it uses law enforcement
practices like the racially-biased traffic stops to enforce drug laws.
African-Americans are just twelve percent of the population and
thirteen percent of the drug users, but they are about thirty-eight
percent of all those arrested for drug offenses, fifty-nine percent of
all those convicted of drug offenses, and sixty-three percent of all
those convicted for drug trafficking. Only thirty-three percent of
whites but fifty percent of blacks convicted of drug crimes have been
sent to prison, and incarcerated blacks get longer sentences than white
for the same crimes: for state drug defendants, the average maximum
sentence length was fifty-one months for whites and sixty months for
blacks.
2. The Creation of Corrosive Cynicism
Without doubt, racially-targeted traffic stops cause deep cynicism
among blacks about the fairness and legitimacy of law enforcement and
courts. Thus it is no wonder that blacks view the criminal justice
system in totally different terms than whites do; they have completely
different experiences within the system than whites have, so they do
not hold the same beliefs about it. Since traffic stops are among the
most common encounters regular citizens have with police, it is hardly
surprising that pretextual traffic stops might lead blacks to view the
whole system differently. One need only think of the split screen
television images that followed the acquittal in the O.J. Simpson
case--stunned, disbelieving whites, juxtaposed with jubilant blacks
literally jumping for joy--to understand how deep these divisions are.
But this cynicism is now beginning to creep into the general
population's perception of the system. Polling data have long shown
that blacks believe that the justice system is biased against them. For
example, in a Justice Department survey released in 1999, blacks were
more than twice as likely as whites to say they are dissatisfied with
their police. More recent data show that a majority of whites believe
that police racism toward blacks is common; specifically, a majority of
both blacks and whites believe that racial profiling is a widespread
problem that must be rooted out. Thus the damage done to the legitimacy
of the system has spread across racial groups, from those most
immediately affected to others.
Perhaps the most direct result of this cynicism is that there is
considerably more skepticism about the testimony of police officers
than there used to be. Predictably, this is especially true in minority
communities, and pretextual traffic stops hammer this point home for
these citizens. When a black driver asks a police officer why he has
been stopped, the officer will probably explain that the driver
committed a traffic violation. This may be literally true--a traffic
offense probably has been committed, since virtually no driver can
avoid committing one. But when the officer asks the driver whether he
or she is carrying drugs or guns, and for consent to search the car, it
becomes more than obvious that the traffic offense is not, in fact, the
real reason that the officer stopped the driver. If the stop was really
about enforcement of the traffic laws, there would be no need for these
questions or any search. Of course, both the officer and the driver
know this. It should surprise no one, then, that those subjected to
this treatment regard the testimony and statements of police with
suspicion. The result will likely be increasing difficulty for
prosecutors when they go into court to try to convict the guilty in any
case that depends upon police testimony, as so many cases do. The
result may be more cases that end in acquittals or hung juries, even
factually and legally strong ones.
3. Plunging Crime Rates: There's More Than One Way to Skin a Cat
Over the last seven years, many cities in the United States have
experienced steep and sustained drops in their crime rates, including
homicide and other violent offenses. This is a national trend; it has
happened in cities from one corner of the country to the other. Though
experts are divided over what accounts for the drop--many say,
candidly, that no one really knows what has caused it--one oft-
mentioned possibility is the role that policing and crime-fighting
tactics may have played in bringing this about.
No city has been more at the forefront of this debate than New
York. Often thought of in the 1980's and early 1990's as a cesspool of
crime, vice, and decay, New York has enjoyed rapid declines in all
major categories of crimes. And New York's mayor, Rudolph Giulliani,
has not been shy about taking credit for these developments and
attributing them to his tough approach to policing: aggressive
enforcement of laws against quality of life offenses like turnstile
jumping, zero tolerance policies on offenses like putting graffiti on
structures, and the use of hyper-aggressive squads like the Street
Crimes Unit focused on stopping and frisking large numbers of people to
look for guns and drugs. These measures may have been tough, but
sometimes toughness is necessary, the mayor and his allies have argued.
Judge us by our results. And by any measure, the results are
impressive. Between 1991 and 1998, the number of homicides in New York
City went from 29.31 to 8.60 per 100,000 citizens, a drop of 70.6
percent. In the same period, robberies dropped from 1,340 to 535 per
100,000 citizens, a 60 percent decline.
But this progress has come at a steep price. Even as crime has come
down, the perception has grown that the New York City Police Department
is especially hard on minorities, especially blacks and Latinos, and
that these groups are being sacrificed--in the form of frequent stops,
frisks, traffic stops, arrests, and general rough treatment accorded
suspects--for the greater good. Indeed, crime rates are down, but
minorities in New York--precisely those people most in need of the help
of the police, since they are disproportionately the victims of crime--
are more than twice as likely to express distrust of police than
whites. Many express fear of the police. William J. Bratton, the
Commissioner of Police during the first two years of the Giulliani
administration, says that while the tough policing strategies may have
been necessary at first, the next phase should have included reaching
out and working with the black community and its leaders to build a
solid foundation of cooperation. Failure to do so, he said, represents
a lost chance to make progress not only on law and order in the city,
but on race relations. And now, in the wake of the trial and acquittal
of the four Street Crimes Unit officers who shot Amadou Diallo, the
hidden costs of Giulliani's aggressive strategy have become apparent:
ever greater distrust and poisoned relations between police and
minority citizens that will take years to overcome. New York City will
be living with the consequences of these policies for a long time after
its current leadership has left the scene.
But, as the old saying goes, there is more than one way to skin a
cat. Contrast what has been happening in New York to events in the same
time frame in two other cities: San Diego and Boston. Both have seen
their crime rates plummet, but these cities have used very different
approaches to policing from New York's. And in neither city will there
be five, ten, or twenty years of poor relationships between police and
citizens that will linger in the air like a noxious mist, as is likely
to be the case in New York.
San Diego took an almost polar opposite position to New York, In
the early 1990's having already taken steps to improve training and
statistical analysis of crime trends, San Diego looked for other
promising approaches that might lead to further reductions in crime.
Jerome Sanders, San Diego's police chief at the time, said that
staffing realities--while New York has 5 officers per thousand
citizens, San Diego had only 1.7 per thousand--dictated a different
tack. New York's aggressive approach was simply out of the question.
``Our basic premise was, we didn't have enough police officers to do it
all, so we needed participation by the community,'' Sanders said. So
San Diego's police force wholeheartedly adopted community policing,
under which police and citizens become partners in the effort to make
cities safer. The police divided the city into 99 neighborhoods, and
assigned teams of officers to each. This allowed citizens to get to
know their ``own'' officers; eventually, they began to give them
information, cooperate with them, and help them solve problems in the
neighborhood. San Diego also recruited and trained a force of 1,200
volunteer citizens to patrol neighborhoods, serving as the Department's
eyes and ears.
Boston's approach has been different those used in both San Diego
and New York. But like San Diego's initiative, Boston did not rely on
New York-style hardball tactics. It began with careful study, in an
effort to figure out what the key sources of crime, especially violent
crime, were, and how to reduce it with the least possible racial
consequences. The racial impact of any effort was an important
ingredient in the plan, since Boston had seen a number of high-profile
crimes grow into community confrontations with significant racial
overtones in recent years. The results of this examination pointed
toward a focus not on drugs or gangs, but on gun violence, and on a
small cluster of ringleaders who were responsible for the presence of
guns on the street. Then, instead of taking it upon themselves to
handle the enforcement effort alone, the police appealed to a coalition
of black ministers and leaders for help and cooperation in going after
the real bad guys. They then held ``call-ins''--meetings between the
ministers, the police and the individuals targeted for enforcement.
These individuals were warned that if violence and the use of guns on
the streets did not stop, they would be arrested and prosecuted in
federal court, where they would face long sentences. Most heeded these
warnings; those that did not were dealt with as promised. The focused
nature of the program--both as to what problem to attack (guns and
associated violence) and which people to target (the truly bad folks
who refused to change their ways) alleviated the need to make
widespread use of targeted traffic or pedestrian stops as New York did,
with the racial antagonism that this brings. In the bargain, the Boston
police built long-term cooperative relationships with the community
that will allow them to approach other problems in the same way in the
future, and at the very least to lessen the damaging ``us vs. them''
mentality so common in New York.
The result in San Diego and Boston has been progress against
serious crime as good or even better than police in New York City have
achieved with their zero tolerance, sweep-the-streets tactics. While
homicide in New York fell 70.6 percent between 1991 and 1998, it
declined almost as much--69.3 percent--in Boston. And San Diego's
results were even more impressive than New York's: a fall of 76.4
percent, the best in the country. The pattern was the same for robbery:
a 62.6 percent decline in San Diego (again, the nation's best),
followed by New York at 60.1 percent. Boston's robbery rate declined
50.2 percent. The lesson is obvious. There is no hard and fast tradeoff
required between making headway on crime and the relationship between
police and the communities they serve. Making the streets safer does
not require the sacrifice of the civil liberties of those in areas with
crime problems, generating a significant backlash against the police.
Simply put, there are other ways.
4. The Undermining of Community Policing
Another reason that it is in the interest of the police to come to
grips with racial profiling follows directly from the discussion above
of the successful efforts of the police in San Diego. Until recently,
police departments have concentrated on answering distress calls. The
idea was to have police respond to reports of crime relayed to them
from a central dispatcher. In essence, these practices were reactive;
the idea was to receive reports of crimes committed and respond to
them.
But over the past few years, modern policing has moved away from
the response model, which was thought to be too slow and too likely to
isolate officers from the places in which they worked and the people
there. In community policing, used so successfully in San Diego, the
idea is for the police to serve the community and become part of it,
not to dominate it or occupy it. This is done by becoming known to and
involved with residents, understanding their problems, and attacking
crime in ways that help address those difficulties. The reasoning is
that if the police become part of the community, members of the public
will feel comfortable enough to talk freely to officers and tell them
what the troubled spots--and who the trouble makers--are. This will
make for better, more proactive policing, aimed at problems residents
really care about, and will make for a greater degree of appreciation
of police efforts by residents and more concern for neighborhood
problems and concerns by the police.
In many minority communities, the history of police community
relations has been characterized not by trust, but by mutual distrust.
In Terry v. Ohio, the 1968 case that is the fountainhead of modern
street-level law enforcement, the Supreme Court candidly acknowledged
this, saying that police had often used stop and frisk tactics to
control and harass black communities. As one veteran African-American
police officer put it, ``Black people used to call the police `the
law.' They were the law . . . The Fourth Amendment didn't apply to
black folks; it only applied to white folks.'' For blacks, trusting the
police is difficult; it goes against the grain of years of accumulated
distrust and wariness, and countless experiences in which blacks have
learned that police aren't necessarily there to protect and serve them.
Yet it is obvious that all of community policing--both its methods
and its goals--depends on mutual trust. As difficult as it will be to
build, given the many years of disrespect blacks have suffered at the
hands of the police, the community must feel that it can trust the
police to treat them as law-abiding citizens if community policing is
to succeed. Using traffic stops in racially disproportionate ways works
directly at cross purposes with this effort. Why should residents of
these communities trust the police if, every time they go out for a
drive, they are treated like criminals, even if this is done in an
effort to catch wrongdoers? If the ``driving while black'' problem is
not addressed, community policing will be made much more difficult or
even fail. Thus, aside from the damage profiling inflicts on African-
Americans, there is another powerful reason to change this police
behavior: It is in the interest of police departments themselves to
correct it.
5. Keeping the Feds out
Several months ago, I testified at a legislative hearing in
Pennsylvania concerning a bill aimed at tackling racial profiling.
Among the witnesses was John Timoney, the Commissioner of the
Philadelphia Police Department. Commissioner Timoney is a former New
York City police officer and administrator, and by all accounts a cop's
cop. In his approximately two years at the helm of Philadelphia's
department, he has made substantial changes and improvement, and enjoys
widespread support among both the public and his own officers. I found
him a personally engaging and well-informed man--tough, no nonsense,
but knowledgable and ready with a joke, too. He advocated very
effectively that day for law enforcement interests.
Two things Commissioner Timoney said that day have stayed with me.
Asked at one point about the issues of race and policing generally,
Timoney gave an answer startling for its candor. ``You'd have to be
brain dead,'' he said, to fail to recognize that police departments
were going to have to deal with issues of race and law enforcement.
Attempting to ignore the issue represented ostrich-like thinking, and
it was clearly in the interest of law enforcement to meet these
challenges head on, on its own terms. He also said something that
pointed very strongly to the current headlines on racial profiling. He
had, he said, a selfish reason of his own for wanting to deal with
racial profiling and associated issues in his department: he wanted to
keep the federal government away. Timoney reiterated this thought the
next month in an interview with the New York Times. With an eye to
federal consent decrees in New Jersey, Pittsburgh, Maryland, and
elsewhere, as well as on a number of federal court orders governing the
Philadelphia department when he began his stint as Commissioner,
Timoney said ``right now, my selfish ancillary goal is to keep the feds
out of Philadelphia.''
I certainly intend no disrespect here toward the federal
government's efforts to rein in troubled police departments. Indeed,
the use of ``pattern and practice'' jurisdiction by the U.S.
Department's Civil Rights Division represents one of the most promising
developments in the battle to force change upon law enforcement
agencies with records of violating the civil rights of their citizens
and failing to address these problems. Cases brought by the department
of Justice under these statutes have resulted in substantial reforms in
a number of police departments at both the state and local level; the
threat of litigation in these situations has acted as a stick to prod
troubled police departments toward changes where in situations in which
a carrot alone would have been ineffective. In the first six years
after the statute was passed, there have been four consent decrees
entered, and there is one active contested piece of litigation going on
now in Columbus, Ohio. Timoney's comment shows just how effective a
tool these actions and the possibility of federal court intervention
can be. Timoney is right to want to avoid having federal officials or
judges dictate the terms under which he runs his department.
Presumably, he is the person responsible to Philadelphians and their
elected officials for the quality of the police force and its work. And
accountability requires authority. It is almost inconceivable that
anyone would want such a demanding job--leader of a large police
agency--without the ultimate authority to run the operation.
Additionally, rules and directives imposed from the outside of a police
department are less likely to be complied with by the rank and file
than policies and orders generated from within. Timoney calls his
desire to avoid federal intervention ``selfish,'' but one could just as
easily view it as a desire to lead his department himself, without
unaccountable outsiders who are less knowledgeable than he is telling
him what to do. If he is influenced in making his choices by the
possibility that the federal government will intervene, so be it. The
central concern is what Timoney does, not his reasons for doing it. For
example, Timoney has moved some modest actions on racial profiling.
These actions include focusing officers who stop cars on arrests of
criminals, not just the making of traffic stops for their own sake.
``When I came here cops were getting credit for the number of people
they simply stopped every month. Can you believe that nonsense? We've
reduced our stops by 50 percent. You get credit when you lock them
up.'' Reducing abusive practices such as these is good policing--even
if the reason for them is simply avoiding federal intervention.
6. The Experience of Great Britain: Better Policing
Some of you may know the name of Stephen Lawrence. Mr. Lawrence was
a black citizen of Great Britain, living in the London area. Several
years ago, he was murdered, a victim of racially motivated killing. By
all accounts, London police, a force that has usually been seen as
among the most professional and well trained in the world, not only
bungled the investigation but did things that showed a truly startling
degree of racial prejudice and insensitivity during the investigation.
In the aftermath of the case, an official inquiry exposed this
incompetence and outright racism, and this led to an examination of the
relations between London police and racial minorities and to come
concrete reforms. Among those reform were stricter regulations on when
and how police could perform ``stops and searches'' including--in a
parallel to our own current debate--collection of data and statistical
analysis of the data to see any racial patterns. Police decried the
data collection requirement almost uniformly, saying it would waste
their time and divert them from the real task of crime fighting.
Now, several years later, preliminary results are in, and they are
striking. According to police officials, data collection and other
reforms have had the effect of decreasing the number of pedestrian and
traffic stops made by police. This was especially true initially; the
effect is less dramatic now, but it still persists. But the upshot has
been a much more effective use of these tactics than was previously the
case. Police are using stops more judiciously and cautiously, focusing
on those most worthy of police attention instead of using stops in a
wholesale, dragnet fashion. The result has been better policing--more
focused, better crime fighting, better use of resources, and
interactions with the public that are much less likely to produce
cynicism and long-term damage to police community relations.
CONCLUSION
There is still some denial that racial profiling exists. But. S.B.
821, the Traffic Stops Study Statistics Act, has begun a transformation
in both the public's thinking and the public discourse about this
problem. That change has now percolated down to the state and local
level, as evidenced by the many state legislative proposals and local
initiatives that have now begun. There is movement on this problem;
there is momentum. And what we must realize is that while S.B. 821
shows us the right direction, it is up to every one of us to begin to
do the heavy lifting that is ahead. Data collection on all traffic
stops is surely the first step on this long road.
Senator Ashcroft. Mr. Hughes, please proceed with your
testimony.
STATEMENT OF JOHNNY L. HUGHES
Mr. Hughes. Mr. Chairman, the Missouri troopers send their
warm regards and thank you for the great work and support.
Mr. Chairman and honorable members of this distinguished
committee, I would like to thank you for giving me the
opportunity to speak on this matter of great interest.
I am a 29-year veteran of the Maryland State Police, a
retired major. I commanded five barracks there and ended up
commanding the Maryland State Police Aviation Division. I have
been doing legislative and congressional affairs work since
1982. I have two sons that were Maryland troopers that worked
drug interdiction on the I-95 corridor since 1996. One was
shot, disabled by drug traffickers. There was a $45,000
contract put out on both of them. The other one has since
resigned from the State police. He is with DEA up in
Philadelphia.
The National Troopers Coalition is composed of State police
and highway patrol agencies throughout our great United States
and has a membership of approximately 45,000 troopers of all
ranks, trooper through colonel. We would be opposed to S. 821
or any legislation of this nature.
I would like to comment that criminal profiling--and,
again, criminal profiling, not racial profiling--criminal
profiling is an effective tool for law enforcement. Local,
State and Federal law enforcement agencies have been utilizing
criminal profiling as a proven and valuable technique to
identify criminals for decades. An example: criminal profiling
is used by the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Behavioral
Science Unit. This developed the criminal profile of serial
murderers as predominately white male loners.
It is no secret that the arrest of specific ethnic groups
is dependent upon demographics. The Interstate I-95 corridor
from New York to Washington, DC, connects inner-city to inner-
city. Primarily, minorities populate these inner cities. The
majority of arrests involving smuggling in crack cocaine,
powder cocaine and heroin along the I-95 New York to
Washington, DC, corridor usually involves African-Americans,
whereas on Interstate 81, passing through the States of
Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia, Tennessee,
most of these arrests are caucasians trafficking in marijuana.
Further, along the southwest border, the States of California,
Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, the majority of drug traffickers
are Hispanics. Out west, in Kansas City and Missouri, we are
showing that caucasians are dealing in designed drugs, mainly
meth, PCP, LSD.
Drugs are trafficked and used by people indigenous to an
area. They employ people known as ``mules'' to transport these
drugs. They are usually from the lower wrung of the socio-
economic ladder and they are often the same ethnicity as the
traffickers because that is who they trust.
Those who are angry that specific ethnic groups are
arrested more than they are represented in the general
population for drug smuggling activities are not grasping
reality. In criminal drug interdiction, you will find it is not
a secret that arrests will not reflect the same percentage of
ethnic groups as they are represented in the general population
of the United States. It is also not a secret that certain
ethnic groups are arrested for a disproportionate amount of
crime as compared to the general population.
Recently, the term ``racial profiling'' has been at the
forefront of some news broadcasts and a hot topic for some
government leaders. Some politicians and government leaders
have wrongly used this term. Racial profiling is a street term,
and only a street term. It is not a textbook or law enforcement
concept. No law enforcement agency teaches or condones racial
profiling.
On the other hand, criminal drug interdiction profiling and
criminal profiling is a good law enforcement practice. This
method of identifying drug traffickers is an essential
component of an officer's training. Police officers are, in
fact, taught to observe the individual for characteristics or
indicators of drug-carrier activity. It is reason, not race,
that directs the attention of police officers to drug
smugglers. Criminal drug interdiction profiling is rooted in
statistical reality.
Thomas Constantine, a personal friend and former
Superintendent of the New York State Police, a very proud
department, and former Administrator of the U.S. Drug
Enforcement Administration, created the DEA Global Enforcement
Teams to assist local police with the arrest of violent drug
offenders.
Within the Rampart area of L.A., the Mobile Enforcement
Teams and LAPD were extremely effective in their operations.
Eighty-five percent of the suspects arrested were minorities.
Policing drugs in an area where 99 percent of crack cocaine is
controlled by minorities will lead to the arrest of primarily
minorities. Again, this is statistical reality, not racial
profiling.
If some misguided governors, politicians and police chiefs
continue to attack the issue of legitimate criminal profiling
and call it racial profiling, legitimate policing of this
Nation's drug carriers will be dramatically reduced. Good
police officers will be afraid to stop anyone for fear of being
labeled a racist and facing retaliation by their police
department and political rivals. Some police commissioners,
superintendents and chiefs have already yielded and are not
supporting their troopers and police officers on this
particular issue.
Overreaction to race rather than crime is a travesty, as
troopers and police officers are in the direct line of fire.
Numerous troopers and police officers have been killed or
severely injured on drug interdiction traffic stops. The
National Troopers Coalition represents 45,000 State police and
highway patrol personnel. These fine troopers and officers of
all ranks, trooper through colonel, support and utilize
professional policing methods. Race-based traffic stops is not
one of them.
And I might add that Carl Williams is a fine man. He was
the former Superintendent of the New Jersey State Police. In
the circles of IACP State and provincial police and the
National Troopers, he was known as Carl ``the truth'' Williams.
He was sacrificed by Governor Whitman for telling the truth.
I would be glad to answer questions on this issue when the
time comes.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you very much, Mr. Hughes.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Hughes follows:]
Prepared Statement of Johnny L. Hughes
Johnny Hughes is a twenty-nine year veteran retired Major of the
Maryland State Police. He is the director of government relations for
the National Troopers Coalition. The National Troopers Coalition is
composed of state police and highway patrol agencies throughout the
United States and has a membership of approximately 45,000 troopers of
all ranks, trooper through colonel.
Mr. Chairman, honorable members of this distinguished committee, I
would like to thank the committee for giving me this opportunity to
speak on this matter of great public interest.
Criminal profiling is an effective tool for law enforcement. Local,
State, and Federal law enforcement agencies have been utilizing
criminal profiling as a proven and valuable technique to identify
criminals for decades. For example, criminal profiling is used by the
Federal Bureau of Investigation's Behavioral-Science Unit, which
developed the criminal profile of serial murderers as predominately
White Male Loners.
It is no secret that the arrest of specific ethnic groups is
dependent upon demographics. The Interstate 95 (I-95) corridor from New
York City to Washington, D.C., connects inner city to inner city.
Primarily minorities populate these inner cities. The majority of
arrests involving smuggling of crack cocaine, powder cocaine and heroin
along the I-95 New York City to Washington, D.C. corridor usually
involves African-Americans. Whereas on Interstate 81 (I-81) passing
through the states of Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia
and Tennessee, most of the arrestees are Caucasians trafficking in
marijuana. Further, along the Southwest Border States of California,
Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, the majority of drug traffickers are
Hispanics.
Drugs are trafficked and used by people indigenous to an area. They
employ people known as ``Mules'' to transport drugs who are usually
from the lower rung of the socio-economic ladder and who are often the
same ethnicity as the traffickers or users.
Those who are angry that specific ethnic groups are arrested more
than they are represented in the general population for drug smuggling
activities are not grasping reality. In criminal drug interdiction, you
will find it is not a secret that arrests will not reflect the same
percentage of ethnic groups as they are represented in the general
population of the United States. It is also not a secret that certain
ethnic groups are arrested for a disproportionate amount of crime as
compared to the general population.
Recently, the term ``Racial Profiling'' has been at the forefront
of some news broadcasts and a hot topic for some government leaders.
Some politicians and government leaders have wrongly used this term.
Racial profiling is a street term and only a street term; it is not a
textbook or law enforcement concept. No law enforcement agency teaches
or condones racial profiling. On the other hand ``Criminal Drug
Interdiction Profiling'' is a good law enforcement practice. This
method of identifying drug traffickers is an essential component of an
officer's training. Police officers are, in fact, taught to observe the
individual for characteristics or indicators of drug courier activity.
It is ``Reason not Race'' that directs the attention of police officers
to drug smugglers. ``Criminal Drug Interdiction Profiling'' is rooted
in statistical reality, not racism.
Thomas Constantine, the former Administrator for the United States
Drug Enforcement Administration, created the D.E.A. Mobile Enforcement
Teams to assist local police with the arrest of violent drug offenders.
Within the Rampart area of Los Angeles, California, the Mobile
Enforcement Teams and L.A.P.D. were extremely effective. In their
operations, 85 percent of the suspects arrested were minorities.
Policing drugs in an area where 99 percent of the crack cocaine is
controlled by minorities will lead to the arrest of primarily
minorities. Again, that is statistical reality not racial profiling.
If some misguided governors, politicians, and police chiefs
continue to attack the issue of legitimate criminal profiling and call
it racial profiling, legitimate policing of this nation's drug couriers
will be dramatically reduced. Good police officers will be afraid to
stop anyone for fear of being labeled a racist and facing retaliation
by their police department and political rivals. Some police
commissioners, superintendents and chiefs have already yielded and are
not supporting their troopers and police officers on this particular
issue. Overreaction to race rather than crime is a travesty as troopers
and police officers are in the direct line of fire. Numerous troopers
and police officers have been killed or severely injured on drug
interdiction traffic stops. The National Troopers Coalition represents
45,000 sworn State Police and Highway Patrol personnel. These fine
troopers and officers of all ranks, Trooper through Colonel, support
and utilize professional policing methods. Race based traffic stops is
not one of them.
Thank you.
Senator Ashcroft. Mr. Welter.
STATEMENT OF JOHN WELTER
Mr. Welter. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Senators, for
inviting me to come and speak. It is very powerful testimony I
heard in the first panel and I want to echo the fact that I
wish that all police officers could have heard that testimony,
particularly the police officers with the San Diego P.D.
Racial profiling, if practiced, does more damage to police-
community relations than almost any other form of police
misconduct. Targeting law-abiding citizens for vehicle stops
and searches based solely on race is a practice that must be
stopped. I am going to discuss the San Diego Police
Department's efforts to address this area of concern, and we
are one of the few that took the lead early on, about a year-
and-a-half ago, to address this issue.
For the past several years, police departments have been
moving toward community policing and problem-oriented policing
as a means of preventing crime, not just responding to the
aftermath, and community policing practices have contributed to
this dramatic drop in crime we have seen across the country.
However, I think that the community policing movement is
based upon the trust developed between the police and the
community, trust that the police are going to work together to
address social disorder, trust that the police and the
community are going to respect each other, and trust in
treating each other in a fair and unbiased way.
I want to thank the Senators for recognizing that many
police officers across this country do a great job at policing.
And, in fact, racial profiling undermines all of the excellent
work that hundreds of thousands of them are doing.
Unfortunately, there are the few police officers who tarnish
all of our badges by their individual behavior.
For the past 12 years, the San Diego Police Department
philosophy has encouraged and actively supported community
empowerment and collaborative problem-solving, and this is no
different. Taking this issue on voluntarily is the way to
address it in the appropriate manner. The department has
initiated numerous proactive efforts to improve our relations
and interactions with the community we serve.
Our voluntary study of vehicle stops and examination of
potential racial profiling is an example of our community
policing efforts, and in early 1999 the P.D. made the decision
to begin collecting data on vehicle stops. We were responding
to requests from community members, from the local ACLU, the
Urban League, and the NAACP to examine the issue of racial
profiling. And it had nothing to do with whether we agreed that
it occurred or didn't occur. It had to do with the fact that
the perception in the community was that it was there.
There were several reasons the police department agreed to
collect the data. First, the department wanted to address any
community perception of racial profiling by San Diego police
officers in the community. Second, the department is a national
leader in community policing and we felt that data collection
was viewed as a means of strengthening our police and community
relationship.
Third, the department command staff believed that the
department personnel were not condoning or practicing racial
profiling and were confident in the results of our evaluation.
Finally, the department worked tirelessly over the past several
years to build trust and credibility with community members and
we felt that this effort seemed to be a logical move to retain
that trust. In addition, the department had automated systems
in place to assist in data collection and we consider ourselves
a leader in automation and use of technology.
Vehicle stop collection began in January 2000. We are going
to continue it through this year. Approximately 150,000 vehicle
stops are expected, based on the annual number of stops that we
do every year. The city council will receive a mid-term
preliminary report in July and complete results on the analysis
will be provided in 2001.
I am not going to spend a lot of time on the methodology. I
did submit a report and that can be reviewed, but I think we
need to talk about the use of technology in regard to this
issue. It is initially hoped that our officers would capture
data using laptop computers, transmit that data over a wireless
system, capture the data, store it in a database, and then come
to a point where we could start doing some analysis.
Since a wireless solution is not yet possible, and we are
right in the middle of developing our fully automated system,
we began by having officers collect data on a 4-by-6 card. The
ease of completing the form ensured that the officers were
going to be fully cooperative with the project. In addition, we
had the chief of police command staff personally work with each
lineup, with each briefing, to talk about the reasons why we
were doing what we were doing.
Soon, we are going to begin the analysis stage. We are not
aware of any published reports or research or any existing
models for methodical control or comprehensive studies on this
material. This will be the very difficult stage. As was
mentioned earlier, this is a first step, and I think that it is
the first step in a process that requires that we do some very
thorough analysis and develop responses that both the community
and the police can be a part of, not just the police.
Therefore, the department plans to use the data it is
collecting during the 1-year study to develop comprehensive,
meaningful conclusions and do something about the issue in San
Diego. The department has engaged prominent researchers and is
seeking grants and other sources of funding in order to help us
with the analysis phase.
And I just want to point out in closing that San Diego P.D.
supports the collection of data for the purpose of examining
this issue. This is a very important issue as it relates to the
relationship of the community and the police. If we are truly
to get to what community policing is all about, then we have to
have the trust of all of the community.
We feel we owe it to our officers, our community, and the
policing profession to take the lead in addressing this issue.
Whether it is perceived or real, it stands in the way of true
community policing practices. We have come too far in
developing trusting relationships to see much of that thrown
away or lost in the possible misconduct of a few officers.
We also believe in the philosophy that the police need to
work closer with the community to prevent crime and to find
real solutions to social disorder. Police officers, in my
opinion, and in the opinion of the San Diego P.D., must accept
the challenge to prove their integrity, but they also must look
for every opportunity to improve their performance.
Thank you.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Welter follows:]
Prepared Statement of John Welter
INTRODUCTION
Racial profiling, if practiced, does more damage to police/
community relations than almost any other form of police misconduct.
Targeting law-abiding citizens for vehicle stops and searches based
solely on race is a practice that must be stopped. I am going to
discuss the San Diego Police Department's efforts to address this area
of concern.
For the past several years police departments have been moving
toward community policing and problem oriented policing as a means of
preventing crime, not just responding to the aftermath. Community
policing practices have contributed to a dramatic drop in crime
throughout the United States. The community policing movement is based
upon the trust developed between the police and resident community.
Police and community members must trust that they truly respect each
other; they must trust in working together to address the social
disorder that contributes to crime; and they must trust in treating
each other in a fair and unbiased way.
Racial profiling undermines all of the excellent work done by
hundreds of thousands of police officers everyday. The vast majority of
police officers respect the individual rights of community members they
serve. Many police officers I speak to are offended someone would even
allege they are violating people's constitutional rights, the very
rights they are sworn to uphold.
Unfortunately, there are those police officers who tarnish all of
our badges by their behavior. Racial profiling does exist. However,
through the efforts of community policing, the San Diego Police
Department, under the direction of Chief David Bejarano, is positioning
itself to better analyze and prevent any possible misconduct.
THE ROLE OF COMMUNITY POLICING
For more than twelve years the San Diego Police Department
philosophy has encouraged and actively supported community empowerment
and collaborative problem solving. The Department initiated numerous,
proactive efforts to improve police/community interaction, thus
ensuring on-going, open dialogue which supports mutual respect and
trust with all members of our communities.
In the early 1990's, the Department completely restructured the
organization to facilitate a transition to Neighborhood Policing, our
version of a community policing philosophy coupled with problem
oriented policing strategies. Based on community and town hall
meetings, employee recommendations and intensive operational analysis,
the following changes were made:
The roles of Department staff were redefined to make problem
solving and neighborhood policing an expectation at all levels
and functions of the Department.
The census-tract based beat system was completely converted
to a system based on residents' definitions of their actual
neighborhoods.
A team policing structure was developed for all patrol
officers, eliminating specialized neighborhood policing teams.
Problem solving principles were incorporated into all
investigative and family protection units, as well as patrol
practices.
A neighborhood policing and problem solving trainer/mentor
program was developed to support line officers and first level
supervisors.
Supervisory responsibilities, shift and assignment structures
were revised to support neighborhood policing and problem
solving practices and expectations.
Civilian, volunteer and reserve officer duties were expanded,
giving the police department one of the largest community
volunteer programs in the nation.
Neighborhood Watch was redefined and redesigned to
incorporate problem solving by community members.
Crime Analysis resources and procedures were revised to
increase their usefulness to both officers and residents in
analyzing and solving community problems.
Training curriculum and personnel performance evaluation
processes were modified to incorporate neighborhood policing
and problem solving into day to day activities.
Dispatch and communications procedures were revised to free
up patrol time for problem solving activities in partnership
with community members.
Department liaisons between area commands, volunteers and
community groups were appointed, and community forums were put
into place for direct community input into policing priorities
and practices.
Throughout the process, particular attention was devoted to
communities that traditionally have not seen law enforcement as allies.
The Department's success is reflected in high citizen satisfaction
ratings among all ethnic and racial groups. In the 1999 victimization
study conducted by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, survey questions
included citizen satisfaction with local police. Of the twelve major
cities included in the study, San Diego scored second highest in
citizen satisfaction, with a 93% satisfaction rating.
This study of vehicle stops and examination of potential racial
profiling is an example of our community policing efforts. We are
demonstrating the Department's commitment to gather data, analyze the
results and share them with the community in an effort to mutually
solve perceived or real problems that inhibit a true working
partnership.
PROJECT HISTORY
In early 1999 the San Diego Police Department made the decision to
begin collecting data relating to vehicle stops. The Department was
responding to requests from the community, including the local ACLU,
Urban League and NAACP, to examine the issue of potential racial
profiling by police officers making vehicle stops. This issue was
receiving Statewide and National attention.
There were several reasons the Police Department agreed to collect
vehicle stop information. First, the Department wanted to address any
community perception of racial profiling by San Diego Police officers.
Second, the Department is a national leader in community policing and
this data collection effort was viewed as a means of strengthening the
police/community relationship. Third, Department command staff believed
that Department personnel were not condoning or practicing racial
profiling and were confident in the results of this evaluation process.
Finally, the Department worked tirelessly over the past several years
to build trust and credibility with community members citizens and this
effort seemed to be a logical move to retain that trust.
In addition, the Department had automated systems in place to
assist in the data collection and analysis phases of the project. These
systems allowed the Department to implement the project at a reasonable
cost, without the need for extensive system development and
implementation, which other agencies might require. However, the
Department's complete vision for automation is still in development.
Once completed, it will permit collection and analysis of this, or any
other type, of data in the future to be faster, easier and even less
costly.
Vehicle stop data collection began in January 2000 and will
continue throughout the year. Approximately 150 thousand vehicle stops
are expected this year, based upon the annual number of traffic stops
the past few years. The San Diego City Council will receive mid term
preliminary results of this data collection in a presentation in July
2000. Complete results and analysis of data will be provided in early
2001.
Following is detailed information on project methodology, future
plans, costs, and transferability of the process to other police
agencies.
METHODOLOGY
To begin the process of collecting vehicle stop information, a
series of community meetings were held and an internal Implementation
Committee was formed. Preliminary decisions were made regarding the
data to be gathered and the format that should be used. An outside
consultant was engaged to review the process, related issues and make
recommendations.
Data Collection
As a result of many community and departmental meetings, analysis
and review of ongoing efforts, the Department decided to collect as
much data as was feasible, without being burdensome to officers. The
following data is collected for every vehicle stop:
Date and time of the stop;
Division where stop occurred;
Primary reason for the stop (moving violation; equipment
violation; radio call, citizen contact; officer observation/
knowledge; Investigative Supplement information on suspect,
Department Bulletin or Log);
Driver's sex and age;
Driver's race (DOJ categories);
Action taken (citation, written warning, verbal warning,
field interrogation, other);
Whether the driver was arrested;
Whether the driver was searched, and if so:
Type of search (vehicle, driver, passengers);
Basis for search (visible contraband, contraband
odor, canine alert, consent search, 4th amendment
waiver, search incident to arrest, inventory search
prior to impound, observed evidence related to criminal
activity, other);
Whether a ``Consent Search'' was obtained;
Whether contraband was found;
Whether property was seized.
Collection Methodology
Another area of concern was the method of collecting data. It was
initially hoped that officers would collect data in a ``wireless'' mode
using the developing laptop computer system. That is, officers would be
able to enter the data into laptops mounted in their patrol vehicles,
electronically transmit the information into a database in the
Department's computer system, and then begin the process of separating
data for the analysis process. However, the development of the
Department automation is not at the stage where this is yet possible.
When the Department's automation is completed, patrol officers will
be able to use laptop computers to: write crime and arrest reports;
transmit and receive criminal history, photographs, maps and other
data; transmit reports; communicate with dispatchers and others; and
access information from any Department computer. Much of this
information will be used to work with community members in their homes
or at community meetings. Taking advantage of emerging technologies
will allow police and the community to develop stronger trust and more
effective partnerships.
Since a ``wireless'' solution was not yet possible when we began
the data collection process we decided to collect data on paper forms.
Officers in the field can easily carry the forms, 4,, by 6,, cards.
Completing the form for each stop takes less than 20 seconds.
The ease of completing the form helped to ensure that officers
fully cooperated with the project. In addition, Chief of Police David
Bejarano prepared a video explaining the project and executive staff
made personal presentations at patrol and traffic briefing. Results so
far have been widespread acceptance of the process. Each day, officers
turn in the forms, which are forwarded to Records Division for manual
data entry.
Part of the development of the data collection process was the
design and implementation of a database structure. The Department's
existing staff and already-developed automated systems ensured the
success of database development.
Data Analysis
Although there has been media coverage of the racial profiling
issue, the Department is not aware of any published academic research,
nor any existing models for methodical, controlled or comprehensive
studies of this material. Therefore, the Department plans to use the
vast data it will be collecting during the one-year period to complete
comprehensive studies and produce meaningful conclusions for the
Department's and community's benefit.
Vehicle stop data collection provides a unique opportunity to
obtain answers to meaningful questions and break new ground in the
applicability of problem solving and community policing, although
numerous questions remain. For example, the data will tell us who is
stopped, why they were stopped, and the results of each stop. What is
the best way to interpret and make use of that information? What other
data can be used in comparison?
Since the Department of Motor Vehicles does not maintain race
designations, there is no way of knowing the demographics of the
driving population. Census populations are not an accurate reflection
of the driving population, because certain segments (e.g., young
adults) are more likely to drive, and to drive more often and further,
than others (e.g., the elderly). Some minority groups, most notably
Southeast Asians and Hispanics, are notoriously undercounted in any
census. With two of the busiest international border crossing in the
world, hundreds of thousands of vehicles cross back and forth between
San Diego and Mexico on a regular basis. Even if motor vehicle records
could give us valuable information for analysis, an unknown proportion
of San Diego drivers may not even have a California drivers' license.
If we do develop comparative driving population estimates, are
there certain variances that are acceptable? If 12% of the driving
population is of a particular ethnicity, and 15% of stops are of that
group, what does this tell us? What if the proportion of vehicle stops
is lower than the driving population? From a community policing
perspective, how does the community see the role of the police
department in traffic stops? What do they expect from the police? What
statistics and information are important to them? What possible
operational changes or training practices will address their concerns
without resulting in unacceptable levels of danger to officers, drivers
and the general public?
The Department has engaged prominent researchers, and is seeking
grants or other sources of funding, in order to answer these questions
and others, using the comprehensive database that is being developed.
Data Dissemination and Conclusions
The Department plan is to disseminate the preliminary results of
the studies in a report and presentation to the City Council
approximately July 2000. A final report and presentation should be
disseminated in early 2001. The Department also expects to disseminate
the information widely to community members through the media and by
making the information available on its Web site.
FUTURE PLANS
As stated, the Department expects to widely disseminate the results
of the study. If there are areas that demonstrate a need for
improvement, the Department will evaluate appropriate operational or
training changes. A decision about the need to continue collecting
vehicle stop data into 2001 will be made by Chief Bejarano at the
conclusion of the first year's study.
COSTS
The Department estimates that its costs for the collection and
analysis of vehicle stop data for a one-year study are as follows:
Data Entry.................................................... $40,000
Professional Consultation..................................... 75,000
Department Technical and Analytical Staff Support............. 30,000
Focus Groups, Miscellaneous Supplies/Services................. 10,000
--------------------------------------------------------------
____________________________________________________
Total................................................... 155,000
TRANSFERABILITY
The San Diego Police Department was positioned to begin its data
collection efforts as early as January 2000 by virtue of having begun
the implementation of a fully automated system. Other law enforcement
agencies and organizations that are not yet automated may find it more
costly or difficult to collect, manually tabulate, complete analysis
and share relevant data. It is important the Federal Government
continue to support all efforts in enhancing or expanding the use of
technology in policing.
SUMMARY
The San Diego Police Department supports the collection of data for
the purpose of examining racial profiling. We feel we owe it to our
officers, our community, and the policing profession to take the lead
in addressing any issues, perceived or real, that stand in the way of
true community policing practices. We have come too far in developing
trusting relationships to see much of it lost in the possible
misconduct of a few officers. We also believe in the philosophy that
the police need to work closer with the community to prevent crime and
find real solutions to social disorder that contributes to crime.
Police officers must accept the challenge to prove their integrity and
look for every opportunity to improve their performance.
Senator Ashcroft. Mr. Rodney Watt, please.
STATEMENT OF RODNEY WATT
Mr. Watt. Thank you. My name is Rodney Watt. At the outset,
I wish to thank the members of this subcommittee for giving me
the opportunity to be of assistance in its work toward finding
a solution to our national problem of racial profiling.
I am currently a police patrol officer for the city of
Highland Park, IL, which is located on the shore of Lake
Michigan about 25 miles north of Chicago. I was born in
Highland Park. I graduated from New Trier High School. I
obtained a bachelor of science degree and later received a
master of science degree.
During training, a rookie police officer in Highland Park
is assigned one or more field training officers, FTO's, to
guide him. My curiosity was aroused almost immediately when my
chief of police told one of my FTO's in my presence, ``Make
sure that he is enforcing the NUT ordinance.'' The NUT
ordinance was an unofficial practice that stood for
``barring''--excuse me for saying this--``niggers uptown.'' We
were to keep African-Americans away from the central business
district's parks and beaches so that the community would not
become nervous. One public park where many Hispanics lived was
even referred to as, ``south of the border.''
These were my first indications that something was amiss in
the Highland Park Police Department's method of dealing with
racial and ethnic minorities. One of my FTO's taught me to park
perpendicular to U.S. 41, a main highway from Chicago to
Milwaukee that splits Highland Park into eastern and western
halves. Once parked in this manner, a police officer shines his
bright lights into cars passing in front of him during the
night, where he sees the race, sex, and even hair color
instantly able to be seen.
If the driver belongs to the wrong minority, the officer
pulls out, stops, and arrests him. Because the driver has done
nothing wrong at this point, my FTO taught me that, ``The
Illinois Vehicle Code is an officer's best friend.'' A broken
tail light, an unlighted license plate light, or alleged
weaving even in one's own lane is sufficient for a stop. Once a
motorist is stopped, the officer can hope to make a drunk
driving, drug, or weapons arrest.
Accusing a motorist of weaving is a standard favorite,
enabling an officer to create probable cause and reasonable
suspicion for a stop. Almost all of my supervisors taught or
tolerated this improper behavior. One supervisor was known to
have given Nazi salutes around the police station. The
supervisor also had an album of Nazi camp songs at his home
that he used to humiliate a Jewish officer when it was played
at a party. Another supervisor made derogatory comments about
many ethnic groups and frequently used the words ``kikes,''
``niggers,'' ``spics,'' ``gooks,'' ``melonheads,'' ``tacos,''
``beaners,'' and ``wetbacks.'' This type of language
dehumanizes and insults the citizens, and sends a signal that
harassment of minorities is justified.
It greatly troubled me when I soon noticed that those
engaged in such conduct were the ones who received extra
training and promotion. I have felt the brunt of the
administration's anger over my refusal to go along. For
instance, I have been subject to constant frivolous
disciplinary proceedings. The worst form of retaliatory conduct
against me was a death threat made upon me by one of my own
FTO's. In addition, I received another threat from a hate
monger. I have been fearful for many months about physical harm
to myself and my family.
There are many other types of abuse going on at my police
department, such as downgrading of crime to make the city look
safer than it is, sexism, giving out test answers by the
administration to favored officers, anti-union activity,
missing weapons, missing drugs with which police dogs are
trained. All of these matters are related to racial profiling,
in that a police department that is divided into ``us'' and
``them'' invariability engages in many types of wrongful
conduct to keep up the wall of separation between those on the
inside and those on the outside.
These and other abuses are detailed in the affidavits of 16
current and former police department officers and dispatchers
who are supporting five additional officers who have sued the
city and disclosed these practices in litigation. All of those
affidavits have been submitted by me to this subcommittee. Most
of those affidavits also speak of the fear of retaliation
inherent in those officers and dispatchers coming forward to
speak the truth about the abuses.
The police department also uses code words to identify
minority motorists who can be stopped. For instance, in the
material I have submitted today there is a transcript of radio
transmissions concerning the arrest of one Mexican-American who
was identified as a ``sombrero.''
I would like to caution the subcommittee that one part of
its proposed bill may not work, specifically the part calling
for the keeping of statistics regarding the race and ethnicity
of those who are stopped. Officers often work alone in their
squad cars and they can get around such requirements merely by
not calling in the stops to the dispatchers, so that no one
will even know they are stopping a suspect on the road. Without
knowledge of the stop, the officer may avoid any report at all.
Finally, Highland Park was founded in 1869. In the past 131
years, Highland Park has never had an African-American officer
or employee. This makes the chief's recent statement that he
has been interested in racial diversity for years ring hollow,
just as hollow as his denials of racial profiling, which has
and does exist on the force. My other 20 fellow police
department employees and those others who are afraid to come
forward would like these practices ended and would like this
subcommittee to do what it can to help reach that goal.
Thank you.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Watt follows:]
Prepared Statement of Rodney Watt
My name is Rodney Watt. At the outset, I wish to thank the members
of this Sub-Committee for giving me the opportunity to be of assistance
in its work toward finding a solution to our National problem of racial
profiling.
I am currently a police Patrol Officer for the City of Highland
Park, Illinois, which is located on the shore of Lake Michigan about 25
miles North of Chicago. I was born in Highland Park, and lived there a
short time while very young. My family moved to another suburb a few
miles closer to Chicago, and I graduated from New Trier High School,
which is often recognized as one of the country's premier high schools.
I then attended Northern Michigan University, where I obtained a B.S.
degree, and later received an M.S. degree from Lewis University.
I attended the Chicago Police Academy, where I was a Class
Commander in my 14 week course because of my high academic achievement.
After graduation from the Academy in early 1992, I considered myself
lucky when I was hired as a Patrol Officer by Highland Park, which has
close to 60 officers, including those on the supervisory level.
Probably because of my strong credentials, my supervisors told me that
I was a ``fair haired boy'' and on the right track. I, in turn, took to
my training period with great enthusiasm.
During training, a rookie police officer in Highland Park is
assigned one or more Field Training Officers (``FTO'') to guide him or
her. My curiosity was aroused almost immediately, when my Chief told
one of my FTO's in my presence, ``Make sure that he is enforcing that
NUT Ordinance.'' Priding myself on having studied Highland Park's
ordinances, I picked up a book containing the ordinances, and began to
look for the NUT ordinance. The Chief was highly amused by this, and
told that FTO that college students think they know so much, but really
don't, because they were not trained in the school of hard knocks. I
soon found out that what the Chief was laughing at was my naivete in
looking up the NUT ordinance at all, because it was not ``official.''
Instead, the NUT ordinance was an unofficial one that stood for barring
(excuse me for saying) ``Niggers Up Town.'' We were to keep African-
Americans away from the central business district, not to mention the
parks and beaches, so that the community would not become ``nervous.''
One public park, near where many Hispanics lived, was even referred to
as ``South of the Border.''
These were my first indications that something was amiss in the
Highland Park Police Department's method of dealing with racial and
ethnic minorities, but they were hardly my last. One of my FTO's taught
me to park perpendicularly to U.S. 41, a main highway from Chicago to
Milwaukee, that splits Highland Park into its Eastern and Western
halves. Once parked in this manner, a police officer shines his bright
lights into cars passing in front of him during the night. Once our
squads were equipped with ``take down'' lights on top, the same thing
could be done with those very powerful lights on the top of the cars.
This causes sort of a movie camera or strobe effect, where the driver's
race, sex, and even hair color is instantly able to be seen. If the
driver belongs to an unapproved group of citizens, the officer can pull
out and stop or arrest him or her.
You are probably wondering how the officer can make an arrest at
this point, since the driver has done nothing wrong. Well, that is
another thing my FTO taught me, by telling me that ``the Illinois
Vehicle Code is an Officer's best friend.'' A broken tail light, an
unlighted license plate, or alleged ``weaving''--even in one's own
lane, is sufficient for a stop. Once a motorist is stopped, the officer
can hope to make a drunk driving, drug, or weapons arrest. Accusing a
motorist of weaving is a standard favorite enabling an officer to
create ``probable cause'' and ``reasonable suspicion'' for a stop or an
arrest at the typewriter, or so my FTO taught me. In short, Highland
Park Patrol Officers were taught to look not for probable cause, but to
target minority groups.
Almost all of my supervisors taught or tolerated this improper
behavior. One of my supervisors was known to give the Nazi salute
around the station, even to a Jewish married couple of officers. This
supervisor also had an album of Nazi ``camp songs'' at his home that he
used to humiliate one of those Jewish officers when it was played at a
party. Another supervisor made derogatory comments about many ethnic
groups, and frequently used the words, ``kike'' and ``nigger'' and
``spic.'' Another supervisor once told me to do my own work, because he
would not be my ``nigger.'' One other supervisor frequently used the
``N'' word, and referred to Asians as ``gooks.'' Yet another supervisor
referred to African-Americans as ``melonheads.'' I also remember a
supervisor frequently calling Mexican-Americans ``beaners'' and
``wetbacks.'' This type of language dehumanizes the insulted citizens,
and sends the signal that harassment of minorities is justified.
However, I was a bit dumbfounded by what I was being taught. I refused
to participate in this sort of conduct, because it went against the my
family's teachings of tolerance that were an important part of my
upbringing. It greatly troubled me when I soon noticed that those who
were not as educated as I was, but who engaged in such conduct, were
the ones who received extra training and promotions. Of course, the
Highland Park supervisors are too sophisticated to directly order
racial profiling. So, they train the recruits they think might ``go
along'' in this (and other wrongful conduct), and then rewarded those
who do go along, while punishing those who do not.
I have felt the brunt of the administration's anger over my refusal
to go along. For instance, I have been subject to constant frivolous
disciplinary proceedings. I was suspended for 30 days for refusing to
make a police report stating that two juveniles had caused an
``explosion'' in a cab when they set off a foul smelling gag toy. I am
under investigation for not properly calling in my morning meal break,
even though I followed the same procedure as every other day in my 9
year career. Just two weeks ago, the Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.,
accompanied me to yet another disciplinary hearing concerning whether I
disobeyed an order not to keep a key to the evidence locker in my
possession overnight. When the Reverend and I tried to submit to the
supervisor a lie detector test that I had passed the day before
concerning the matter, it was flung back in our faces with the comment
to the Reverend that he should not try to tell the supervisor how to
run an investigation. Other disciplinary matters are also being pursued
against me. In addition, I have been denied advancement. I have been a
certified scuba diver since about 1986, but I have been unable to find
a place on the Police Department's Dive Team. About a week ago, I asked
my supervisor for a recommendation for advancement, and he told me ``I
don't like your lawsuit, and I don't like the people around you,'' so
he would not give me a recommendation. I was given an interview despite
my lack of a recommendation, however it was conducted by the same
supervisor who flung the lie detector test back at the Reverend Jackson
and myself.
Of course, the worst form of retaliatory conduct against me was the
death threat made upon me by one of my former FTO's. In addition, I
received an anonymous page, which when I called it back, was another
threat from what appeared to be a white hate monger. I have been
fearful for many months now about physical harm to myself and my
family.
There are many other types of abuses going on at my Police
Department, such as the downgrading of crime to make the City look
safer than it is, sexism, the giving out of test answers by the
administration to favored officers, anti-union activity, missing
weapons, and missing drugs with which our police dogs are to be
trained. All of these matters are related to the racial profiling in
that a Police Department that is divided into ``us and them''
invariably engages in many types of wrongful conduct to keep up the
wall of separate between those on the inside and those on the outside.
These and other abuses are detailed in the affidavits of 16 current and
former Police Department officers and dispatchers who are supporting 5
additional officers who have sued the City and disclosed these
practices in the litigation. All of those affidavits have been
submitted by me to this Sub-Committee. Most of those affidavits also
speak of the fear of retaliation inherent in those officers and
dispatchers coming forward to speak the truth about all the abuses.
Some citizens and even some City Counsel members in Highland Park
have expressed doubt that racial profiling can exist in such an
affluent suburb. That doubt is not well founded, however. In the
materials I have submitted today, there is a transcript of the radio
transmissions concerning the arrest of one suspect. If I were to tell
you that the suspect who was arrested was ``a hat,'' you likely would
have no idea what I was talking about. However, when the suspect was
identified as ``a hat'' on the transcript, all the other officers
listening understood the code. The ``hat'' was then more closely
identified as a ``big sombrero,'' which meant, according to the
transcript, that it was ``probably filled with beer bottles.'' Maybe
the word, ``sombrero'' gave you a hint of what was meant by the code
words. A full translation of ``a hat filled with beer bottles'' is that
there is a Mexican on the highway, so he is fair game to arrest,
because among Highland Park Police Officers, it is understood that the
words, ``a hat'' or ``a sombrero'' means there is a Mexican-American on
the road who may be stopped without probable cause, just to see if he
is drunk, in which case he may be arrested.
I would like to caution this Sub-Committee, however, that one part
of its proposed bill may not work, specifically, that part calling for
the keeping of statistics regarding the race and ethnicity of those who
are stopped. Highland Park Police Officers work alone in their squad
cars, and are taught that if they put aside their concerns for safety,
they can get around such requirements merely by not calling in their
stops to the dispatchers, so that no one will even know that they are
stopping a suspect on the roads. Without knowledge of the stop, the
officer may avoid any report at all.
Finally, Highland Park was founded in 1869. In the past 131 years
since its founding, Highland Park has never had an African-American
officer, and as the Reverend Jackson observed, it does not even have an
African-American janitor. This makes the Chief's recent public
statement that he has been interested in racial diversity on the force
``for years'' ring hollow--just as hollow as his denials of racial
profiling--which has, and does exist on the force. My other 20 fellow
police department employees--and there are others who are afraid to
come forward--would like these evil practices ended, and would like
this Sub-Committee to do what it can to help reach that goal.
Senator Ashcroft. Senator Torricelli is a member of the
Judiciary Committee and represents the State of New Jersey and
has asked to introduce the Honorable Leroy Jones.
STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE
STATE OF NEW JERSEY
Senator Torricelli. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, very much, and
thank you very much for holding this hearing. Mr. Chairman, the
State of New Jersey has the unfortunate distinction of having
had a problem of racial profiling which was played out before
the Nation. It also has the distinction, I think, of dealing
with it first, honestly, and I hope successfully.
Yesterday, the Attorney General of the United States
appointed a monitor for the State police in New Jersey to
assure that the reform of the State police to a new level of
racial and ethnic sensitivity is accomplished. Assemblyman
Jones, who appears before you, is one of those who has led this
effort. A leader of the Black and Latino Caucus in the State
legislature, he participated in a meeting that I helped arrange
with Deputy Attorney General Holder a year ago which has led to
this monitor.
We are enormously proud in New Jersey that we had a serious
problem, it persisted, but we have faced it honestly and I
believe ultimately thoroughly. We are proud of good people in
the State police. We have many good people who serve with the
State police and they deserved better than the reputation they
were getting because of problems of leadership and very
misguided policies.
I also, if you will forgive me, Mr. Chairman, in
introducing Assemblyman Jones simply want to say something
about the governor of my State, who is not of my party but of
whom I am very proud that against enormous opposition she faced
the problem of racial profiling after it had persisted for many
years and did dismiss the Superintendent of the State Police of
New Jersey, who deserved to be dismissed.
Racial profiling cannot be defended. As I believe Professor
Harris demonstrated, statistically it cannot bear evidence to
those who suggest, as our former superintendent of the State
police suggested, that certain ethnic or racial groups
disproportionately commit crimes. They do not. This has not
been a proud time for my State before we dealt with this issue.
Perhaps it is helpful that the State that dealt with it first,
and I believe most honestly, was a northern State that prided
itself on racial sensitivity and social enlightenment. It
provides real evidence that nowhere in the country is there an
exception to old prejudices and bigotry. We have dealt with it.
I simply, Mr. Chairman, asked for this moment to introduce
Assemblyman Jones because he has played such an important role
in my State in bringing this hopefully to an end.
Senator Ashcroft. Assemblyman Jones.
STATEMENT OF HON. LEROY J. JONES, JR.
Mr. Jones. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you
very much, Senator Torricelli, and certainly to Senator
Feingold.
On behalf of the New Jersey Legislative Black and Latino
Caucus and the entire family of minority residents in my State,
let me thank you all for this privilege to provide testimony
regarding the Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act of 1999.
Racial profiling has been a silent scourge in New Jersey
for many minority motorists for a long time. While never, ever
officially sanctioned, it was the standard operating procedure
for State troopers to pull over cars containing black and
Latino occupants.
As the Nation began to step up its war on drugs over the
past 20 years, State police developed stealth justification for
stopping vehicles containing blacks and Latinos because they
simply fit the profile of likely drug couriers. In our State,
supervisory officers routinely displayed indifference toward
complaints registered by law-abiding minority motorists who
were pulled over by overly aggressive and confrontational
highway troopers.
This opened the door to further abuse by ill-intentioned
troopers who saw an opportunity to intimidate, to abuse, and
even terrorize minority motorists, and you have heard a little
bit of that today. It was a travesty on many levels. In our
community, the ongoing incidence of racial profiling simply
fosters resentment and anger. In the police profession, there
was a breakdown in the ethics of upholding the law. There were
cases of illegal searches, falsified reports of police
personnel.
Even court intervention had little impact on the situation.
In March 1996--and Senator Lautenberg talked about this a
little bit--a lower court State judge declared that troopers
patrolling the southern stretches of the New Jersey Turnpike,
I-95, engaged in racial profiling to stop and arrest minority
motorists from 1988 to 1991. That case was decided largely on
the basis of statistical analysis offered by Dr. John Lamberth,
Chairman of the Psychology Department at Temple University.
He documented that blacks accounted for between 35 percent
and 46 percent of motorists stopped, and 73 percent of those
arrested along the southern end of the turnpike. Now, let me
just put those numbers in context for you. African-Americans
constitute 13 percent of the State's population. The percentage
of black motorists is perhaps even smaller.
Senators, so deep was the perpetual state of denial about
racial profiling in my State that the State attorney general's
office worked for 3 years to overturn that landmark lower court
decision. Instead of recognizing the need of statistical
reporting, the State sought to bury the issue.
Racial profiling, in fact, did not reach a critical mass
until April 1998, when two State troopers fired 11 shots into a
van carrying four unarmed young black and Latino men, wounding
three of them. It became a nationally publicized case.
Legislators like myself, clergy, and community activists
stepped forward taking efforts to put an end to the hostile
environment that existed along our highways.
We were, however, constantly frustrated by one huge
impediment, the lack of reporting about the racial
characteristics of motorists subjected to highway stops. It
took an enterprising newspaper, gentlemen, with a good lawyer
to finally shed some light on this problem. On February 10,
1999, the Star-Ledger of Newark gained access to police records
showing that minorities made up 75 percent of the people
arrested along the turnpike during the first 2 months of 1997.
The figure was inescapably disproportionate and truly alarming.
The State attorney general's office hastily announced a
comprehensive investigation of the 2,600-member State trooper
force. Days later, the U.S. Justice Department revealed that it
had been investigating racial profiling in New Jersey for over
1 year.
Citing the continued lack of statistical information and
the State's repeated denials, my colleagues and I from the
Black and Latino Caucus took testimony from racial profiling
victims like you have done here today. We listened to over 30
hours of testimony. The human toll was dramatically captured by
one Dorothy Cobbs, a 52-year-old homemaker from New York.
Senators, she wept like the young man in the video as she
recounted her ordeal with State troopers during a stop along
the Garden State Parkway in 1996. Troopers cursed, spat upon
her, maced and brutalized her before charging her with multiple
offenses. Ms. Cobbs later won a $225,000 settlement in a
Federal civil rights case.
After the hearings, the Caucus issued a report which I have
here today and I will respectfully submit to the record.
[The report referred to is retained in the committee
files.]
Mr. Jones. We produced a 32-bill legislative package to
combat racial profiling and job discrimination. No less than
five of those bills pertained to issues of reporting and
compiling information about motor vehicle stops and
corresponding arrests by troopers who patrol New Jersey's
highways. We believe, Senators, that reporting and statistical
analysis are intrinsic in preventing recurrences of
institutionalized racial profiling. It fosters accountability
at all levels of law enforcement.
Clearly, the New Jersey experience is illustrative of why
the Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act is so critically
necessary. Racially-motivated traffic stops are liable to
flourish when there is no adequate scrutiny of what drivers
police choose to pull over along our highways. In empowering
the Justice Department to compile and analyze data on traffic
stops, there may be new light shed on the insidious practice of
racial profiling, its pervasiveness and its causes.
The approach you consider here today will help everyone. It
will discourage unscrupulous police officers from
indiscriminately engaging in reprehensible conduct, conduct
that tarnishes the image of their fine profession and drives
that wedge between them and the people that they have sworn to
protect and serve.
Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, that concludes my
comments and I am certainly prepared to answer any questions
that you might have with respect to the New Jersey experience.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Jones follows:]
Prepared Statement of LeRoy J. Jones, Jr.
Thank you, Senator Torricelli. On behalf of the New Jersey
Legislative Black and Latino Caucus and the entire family of minority
residents in my state, let me thank you for this privilege to provide
testimony regarding the Traffic Stops Statistics Act of 1999.
Racial profiling has been a silent scourge for as long as New
Jersey's minority motorists can remember. While never officially
sanctioned, it was standard operating procedure for state troopers to
pull over cars containing black occupants.
As the nation stepped up its war on drugs over the past 20 years,
State Police developed stealth justification for stopping vehicles
containing blacks because they fit the profile of likely drug couriers.
Supervisory officers routinely displayed indifference toward
complaints registered by law-abiding minority motorists who were pulled
over by overly aggressive and confrontational highway troopers.
This opened the door for further abuse by ill-intentioned troopers
who saw an opportunity to intimidate, abuse, even terrorize minority
motorists. It was a travesty on many levels. In the minority community,
the ongoing incidents of racial profiling fostered resentment and
anger. In the police profession, there was a breakdown in the ethic of
upholding the law. There were cases of illegal searches and falsified
reports by police personnel. Even court intervention had little impact
on the situation.
In March 1996, a lower-court state judge declared that troopers
patrolling the southern stretches of the New Jersey Turnpike engaged in
racial profiling to stop and arrest minority motorists from 1988 to
1991. That case was decided largely on the basis of statistical
analysis offered by Dr. John Lamberth, chairman of the Psychology
Department at Temple University. He documented that blacks accounted
for between 35 percent and 46 percent of the motorists stopped and 73
percent of those arrested along the southern end of the Turnpike.
Let me put those numbers in context for you: African-Americans
constitute 13 percent of the New Jersey population; the percentage of
black motorists is probably even smaller.
So deep was the perpetual state of denial about racial profiling in
my state that the state's Attorney General Office worked for three
years to overturn that landmark lower-court ruling. Instead of
recognizing the need for more statistical reporting, the state sought
to bury the issue.
Racial profiling, in fact, did not reach a critical mass until
April 23, 1998, when two state troopers fired 11 shots into a van
carrying four unarmed young black and Latino men, wounding three of
them. It became a nationally publicized case.
Minority legislators like myself, clergy, and community activists
stepped up efforts to put an end to the hostile environment along the
highways. We were, however, constantly frustrated by one huge
impediment: a lack of reporting about the racial characteristics of
motorists subjected to highway stops.
It took an enterprising newspaper with a good lawyer to finally
shed some light on the problem. On Feb. 10, 1999, the Star-Ledger of
Newark gained access to police records showing that minorities made up
75 percent of the people arrested along the Turnpike during the first
two months of 1997. The figure was inescapably disproportionate.
Alarming.
The state Attorney General's Office hastily announced a
comprehensive investigation of the 2,600 member state trooper force.
Days later, the U.S. Justice Department revealed that it had been
investigating racial profiling in New Jersey for over a year. Citing
the continued lack of statistical information and the state's repeated
denials, my colleagues and I in the Black and Latino Caucus took
testimony from racial profiling victims.
The human toll was dramatically captured by Dorothy Cobbs, a 52-
year-old homemaker from New York. She wept as she recounted her ordeal
with state troopers during a stop along the Garden State Parkway in
1996. Troopers cursed, spat upon, maced and brutalized her before
charging her with multiple offenses. Mrs. Cobbs later won a $225,000
settlement in a federal civil rights case.
After the hearings, the Caucus issued a report and produced a 32-
bill legislative package to combat racial profiling and job
discrimination. No less than five of the bills pertain to issues of
reporting and compiling information about motor vehicle stops and
corresponding arrests by troopers who patrol New Jersey's highways.
We believe that reporting and statistical analysis are intrinsic to
preventing recurrences of institutionalized racial profiling. It
fosters accountability at all levels of the law enforcement process.
Clearly, the New Jersey experience is illustrative of why the
Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act is so critically necessary. Racially
motivated traffic stops are liable to flourish when there is inadequate
scrutiny of what drivers police choose to pull over along our highways.
By empowering the Justice Department to compile and analyze data on
traffic stops, new light might be shed on the insidious practice of
racial profiling--its pervasiveness, its causes.
The approach you are considering here will help everyone involved.
It will discourage unscrupulous police officers from indiscriminately
engaging in reprehensible conduct--conduct that tarnishes the image of
their fine profession and drives a wedge between them and the people
they have sworn to protect and serve.
Senator Ashcroft. The Senator from Wisconsin is recognized.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First, I ask
unanimous consent that the following statements be entered into
the record of the hearing: statements from the NAACP, the
National Black Police Association, and Progressive Policy
Institute, as well as the statements of two Wisconsin
constituents, Mr. and Mrs. Trent Jackson, and Ms. Karen Murphy
Smith.
Senator Ashcroft. Without objection.
I would again reiterate our willingness to accept and
receive testimony and comment from any of you, additionally,
and including those who could not come today. We are very
pleased to do that and we will hold the record open for several
days so that can be achieved.
[The statements referred to can be found in the appendix.]
Senator Ashcroft. Go ahead.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me thank all the witnesses. I want to particularly
thank Mr. Watt, who lives on the other side of the great Packer
and Bear divide, but on either side of that divide, we would
say you have guts. You deserve praise, not threats, and I thank
you.
Let me begin by asking Professor Harris, you have heard
testimony from all the witnesses. I would like to invite you to
respond to what the other witnesses have said. Particularly, I
would be interested in any responses you have to the testimony
of Mr. Hughes.
Mr. Harris. Yes, Senator, I would be glad to respond. My
response to Mr. Hughes' testimony is that I believe that when
he says that this type of enforcement merely reflects
statistical reality, he has fallen victim to the same
statistical fallacy that I was pointing at.
The use of arrest statistics does not illuminate drug use.
It does not illuminate the prevalence of drug trafficking. It
is a reflection of enforcement. So when we use drug statistics,
as he did in his testimony, to justify this practice, to call
it effective, what we are doing is we are caught in a self-
fulfilling prophecy. If we look to those we arrest to determine
who we arrest in the future, we will continue to look at those
same people.
There is a relationship, in short, between where you look
for things and where you are likely to find them. If you look
in the cars of African-Americans and Latinos, most often that
is where you will find the stuff and that is who you will
arrest. Those arrest statistics will go up, the statistics in
the prisons will go up. And you will go out and you will do the
same thing all over again the next day because your experience
has confirmed what you thought in the first place.
If we thought that 40-year-old white law professors were
likely to have more contraband and we could figure out a way to
identify them from a distance, I guarantee you that within 3
years the statistics for 40-year-old white law professors would
show many more arrested. It is that simple. Relying on arrest
statistics does not tell us enough, and that is why we so
desperately need the statistics that this bill would provide.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, professor.
Mr. Welter, I applaud the commitment and leadership shown
by the San Diego Police Department on this issue, and the tone
of your remarks. I mean, you are the example of the law
enforcement I know in this country, and particularly in my
State, and I think it is an extremely positive message.
I guess specifically I would like to know how much time it
does, in fact, take for an officer to collect this data in
writing, and how much time do you think it will take for an
officer to collect data with the wireless computer system once
it is fully operational?
Mr. Welter. Thank you, Senator, for the compliment. We
developed a form that is a pretty simple form to fill out. It
is similar in data to what the bill calls for, almost
identical, in fact, and we developed that form several months
ago. It takes an officer about 20 seconds to fill out the form.
We also don't require that the officer sign the form and there
is no information about the driver on the form.
The form is attached to any documentation, whether it be a
citation or a warning or an arrest report. And then once it is
submitted, it is separated at that time so there is no way to
track it back to either the officer or the person who is
stopped.
Once we get our wireless technology up to speed, which I am
hoping we will get support to do that, we anticipate--right
now, our officers have laptop computers in their cars. They use
those computers to do a myriad of things, including working
with the community on problem-solving, and so on and so forth.
But the nice part about that technology is we will be able to
capture that data in even a quicker fashion. We will be able to
send it automatically over the air waves to the station. We
won't have to depend on laborious data entry personnel to enter
all that data.
In addition, it will be the first step toward our analysis
process. So we will be able to take that data and separate it,
and that is the true problem here is how do we analyze the
data, because I think many times just raw data is not going to
tell us a lot of things. What we really need to do is get at,
OK, how does this data either support conclusions or not
support them, and also how are we going to use this data to do
something about looking at policies, procedures, operations,
and relationships.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, Mr. Welter.
Back to Professor Harris for just a moment, if you could
respond to the concern that I think Mr. Watt raised that
officers will not always report stops.
Mr. Harris. Yes, and that is a good question, Senator.
There is always the chance in any statistical or other
reporting system that it can be manipulated or dodged. The key
thing is if we are going to have statistical collection to make
sure that it is thorough and to make sure that there are
auditing systems of one type or another put into place. These
can be constructed in many ways. I won't take your time by
going into the details of any one because we don't want to have
a one-size-fits-all solution because every department is
frankly very different.
It can be done, though; it can be done. It has been done
for statistics for many other law enforcement purposes. The
important point to remember is that unless we measure
something, we can't manage it. You cannot manage what you don't
measure. We have to take the first steps. I applaud San Diego
and San Jose and the other cities that have done that, and it
can be done. It is not an easy problem. Officer Watt raises a
very good issue. It is something we have to think about in
advance, but it can be done.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, professor, and thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
Senator Ashcroft. Senator Torricelli.
Senator Torricelli. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will only
take a minute. Mr. Chairman, like Senator Feingold, I want to
note the powerful testimony I have heard today from Mr. Watt. I
will feel good when racial profiling is eliminated in our
country, but I will feel even better if it is eliminated
because white police officers played a role in bringing it to
an end.
You are a man of extraordinary courage, and I was very
moved and extremely pleased by your testimony, as I was by
yours, Chief. I thank you for being here and the role that you
have played.
I wanted to just ask a couple of things, and perhaps,
Professor Harris, I could start with you on this. Last year, I
had an amendment included in the omnibus appropriations bill
for $7 million to install video cameras in police cars. In my
conversations with Governor Whitman of New Jersey, one of the
things we agreed to do is she will use State money to start
putting video cameras in State trooper cars on the turnpike. I
agreed to try to get additional Federal money to help ensure
that as many police cars in the state get video cameras as
possible. It is my belief that this was not only in the
interest of the motorists so that there was a record of who was
stopped and whether they were treated fairly, because as
Assemblyman Jones noted, not only were people being stopped,
but they were being abused, but also in the interest of State
troopers as it provides them a defense against false
accusations. While there is a legitimate problem of profiling,
that charge can also then be seized upon by people who are
committing crimes and used as an excuse to complain.
Could you comment on the use of these video cameras?
Mr. Harris. Senator Torricelli, I think that is an
excellent issue you have put your finger on. The use of these
cameras, while not a panacea, certainly help advance both our
factual knowledge, our ability to monitor and supervise
behavior if we are police administrators, and it will protect
officers against false claims. As you say, I think that is
something that is a real benefit to the police officers
involved.
Also, it can serve as evidence of crimes in criminal court.
I can still remember the first time as a young prosecutor when
I was in criminal court watching a video of a DWI suspect. I
mean, no testimony was necessary at all. Just watching the
videotape of that man slouching on his car was enough. So these
camera systems can do a number of things. They can help us
address racial profiling, they can make for better
administration. They can even make the statistics gathering
easier and they are good for law enforcement all around.
Senator Torricelli. Assemblyman Jones, while it took New
Jersey a long time to come to terms with the problem of racial
profiling and the State government was in denial through
several administrations, are you now convinced that we are at a
point where there is a general acceptance of the extent of the
problem and of the need to address it? Have we reached near
consensus in the State of New Jersey at this point?
Mr. Jones. Senator, I believe that recent polls have
determined that there has been acceptance of the fact that
racial profiling is real and it exists. And the issue that was
glaringly obvious was that was not necessarily a reality in the
white community. But I believe because of New Jersey's
experience that that now has been elevated to a reality in the
white community.
Senator Torricelli. Well, the process began when the U.S.
Justice Department became involved first in monitoring the
State police and finally in appointing a federal monitor which
culminated yesterday in Mr. Rivas' appointment. I was pleased
with Mr. Rivas' appointment and I think he seems well
qualified. He seems to have the confidence of law enforcement,
and yet I believe he will be sensitive and work closely with
the leadership in the minority community.
Do you share confidence in this process?
Mr. Jones. Absolutely, very, very pleased with the Deputy
AG's actions to date. Let me just say that I am also encouraged
by the appointment of a new Superintendent of the New Jersey
State Police. And I do believe that inasmuch as we are very
early in the process and we have not been able to measure that
progress just because of time----
Senator Torricelli. But certainly the State troopers
themselves feel better about themselves now and about their
relationship with people in the State and their mission. I
think this has not only been reassuring to the members of the
minority community, but in my own estimation helpful to State
troopers.
Mr. Jones. I believe so. I believe that the rank and file
will go through a healing period because obviously there were
some morale issues as a result of all that was going on. But I
am encouraged that as we continue to take steps forward that
those things will heal.
Senator Torricelli. And my colleagues should know we can
feel very good about the role of the Justice Department. If New
Jersey is to be the test case where we dealt with this issue
first and came to some fair solution, the U.S. Justice
Department handled this promptly, thoroughly, and fairly, and I
was extremely pleased.
Mr. Chairman, thank you for allowing me to join you today
and for holding this hearing.
Senator Ashcroft. Thank you very much.
I want to thank the members of the panel, all of you, for
coming, and I won't reiterate remarks that have already been
made. I really feel like I need to ask Mr. Hughes if he has
comments that he would like to make because the questioning has
focused on the rest of the panelists and I think, in fairness,
I want to give him an opportunity to make some statements.
May I just indicate some areas of interest that I have, and
this is one of these topics that we could probably ask
questions on for a long time. You seem to raise the distinction
between--criminal drug interdiction profiling was one phrase
you used, and racial profiling. I guess what I would ask is, is
there a possibility that law enforcement can continue to use
profiling as an enforcement tool, or should or should not,
absent race? I think a profile usually is more than one
characteristic.
So can you kind of address that? I am not an expert in
police work, but it seems to me that there are some profiling
things that might be helpful in enforcement, and is it possible
that we could use that without infringing the integrity of
American citizens who need to be treated equally based on race?
Mr. Hughes. Yes, sir, definitely so. Criminal profiling is
a good thing. Like I stated, it is a multitude of indicators or
characteristics. Race is not one of these. First of all, you
have to have probable cause for a motor vehicle stop. Second of
all, if you look at DEA statistics--and I disagree with
Professor Harris. He suggests that we ignore or do away with
criminal statistics, criminal profiling. What would he suggest
to replace these? How would we develop the profile if all
statistics are not considered?
If you talk to African-American police chiefs, two of the
country's most notable, Bernie Parks in L.A. and Ruben
Greenberg in Charleston, SC, they will echo the same sentiments
as I have stated here today. It is reason, not race. You
enforce the laws, you stop crime. You can't have race come in
and say, well, we are enforcing crime on race. You have to
enforce the crime and then you keep statistics on the person
that you arrest, or persons that you arrest.
I agree with the professor that you can play with
statistics. I have seen it done in the State police. And I am
not saying the Maryland State Police did not have problems.
They had some problems, also, and they have cleaned them up.
And I am not saying we don't have bad cops. We do have bad
cops, African-American, Hispanic, caucasian. And you are not
going to solve deep-rooted family prejudices with this Traffic
Statistics Act. You are always going to have those; you are
always going to have isolated cases. I have heard some here
today that I have heard before and I was appalled by them also.
They are going to continue.
I would find it very difficult for me to stop and go
through the litany of questions that are in this Traffic
Statistics Act and ask anyone here, with the mixed marriages
and all today, are you African-American, or are you caucasian,
or are you Latino? Right away, that is going to set off a
confrontation for that officer.
And another thing: traffic on Interstate 95, with the
statistics that I have seen within the Maryland State Police
when I was there, it was ludicrous. I mean, it is an interstate
highway. My God, you know, you have individuals from New York
to Florida. You can't base the statistics in Maryland or New
Jersey on the population of ethnicity for that ethnic group in
that specific State. You just can't do it.
So I think we are overreacting to a problem. And I am not
saying not to correct the problem. Please correct the problem,
but don't go overboard and don't broad-brush all law
enforcement for the actions of a few. Most police departments
do keep good records, and I think it is incumbent upon
governors and mayors to look at it. You know, if the police
chief is not doing his job, fire him, terminate him or her. But
I agree with you, Senator, on that comment.
Senator Ashcroft. Well, I wanted to try and make it clear
that there is a broader issue about profiling generally. Racial
profiling, it seems to me, is a very much more narrow issue and
much more problematic.
Mr. Welter, thank you for coming from San Diego to help us.
As a sort of pioneer in this arena, you can help enlighten us.
Do you have any way of identifying the neighborhood in which a
stop is made, and do you try to correlate the racial
composition of the neighborhood vis-a-vis the stop or anything
like that in the data that you are keeping?
Mr. Welter. You know, that is part of the problem with the
data collection and the way that it is being collected. And,
again, we don't have a way--obviously, one neighborhood has a
different ethnic or racial makeup than another, certainly. But
then you also throw in the variables of what is the driving age
or the number of people that drive in that particular ethnic or
racial makeup. So statistics and the raw numbers--this is why
we are seeking expert research consultants to help us with our
analysis because it is a very difficult process, and I don't
have the answer to that question, Senator.
Senator Ashcroft. Well, I think it is very easy to come to
quick conclusions from data, but we wouldn't want to do that, I
don't think, recklessly because what we are trying to avoid is
a reckless, quick conclusion based on something else that
doesn't lead us to the truth.
Mr. Welter. We are capturing the division where the stop is
made. In our city, we have eight divisions that are very broad
and very diverse. In fact, in one community there are 30-some
different languages spoken. So to try to figure out anything in
regard to ethnic or racial breakdown in that community will be
very difficult.
Senator Ashcroft. Well, let me thank all of you for your
patience. We have spent a little extra time.
Did you want to make some closing remarks?
Senator Feingold. One sentence, Mr. Chairman. I just want
the record to be clear, and I am glad that you gave Mr. Hughes
a chance to give his opinion. The legislation does not call for
the officer to inquire about a person's race or background. It
merely asks the officer to give their perception. So the notion
that there would be a confrontation on that point is mistaken.
That is not a part of the legislation.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you again for your
tremendous cooperation and all the time you have been willing
to devote to this.
Senator Ashcroft. I think this has been a very informative,
productive hearing. I want to thank all of the witnesses. Every
witness has brought something to this table that wouldn't
otherwise have been here. I am grateful for that.
This does continue to be an issue of national concern to
citizens and officials of all persuasions. We have a situation
where we have a Republican governor like John Rowland of
Connecticut signing legislation that will require the
collection of this kind of data, and a Democratic governor like
Gray Davis of California vetoing it because he believes it is
too burdensome for officers. So there are broad views.
We have heard some very, very serious stories about
individuals and their experiences, and there are some different
views on how best to address the issue. But I think in large
measure the idea that race becomes the basis upon which someone
is arrested--I would hope that we all understand that that is
not an appropriate basis for an arrest.
I hope that the members who are here today have found this
as useful as I have, and as I mentioned at the beginning of
this hearing, I think the Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act is
at least a good point of departure for getting a better picture
of what the scope and depth of this issue is. I look forward to
working with Senator Feingold and other cosponsors of the
legislation to see if we can make it legislation which is
valuable, meaningful, and worthy of support.
With that, I want to thank you all for being here and
commend you for your willingness to provide us with this
information.
[Whereupon, at 4:31 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
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Additional Submissions for the Record
----------
Prepared Statement of Mr. Hilary O. Shelton, Director, Washington
Bureau of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People
Thank you, Senator Ashcroft, for agreeing to hold this hearing and
to you, Senator Feingold, for asking me to submit a statement on behalf
of the NAACP for the record.
Racial profiling is an extremely disturbing and alarmingly
prevalent practice in America today. The fact of the matter is, if you
are a person of color living in the United States, there are law
enforcement officials that look at you differently, and with a greater
level of suspicion. They always have, and until something is done to
raise the level of accountability, they will continue to do so.
The result of this bias is that ethnic minorities are stopped
walking on the streets, while driving their cars, while trying to
travel through airports, or while trying to enter their homes, at
disproportionate rates. Furthermore, because of this increased
suspicion, people of color are, as we see time and again, treated much
more aggressively and with much more force than their Caucasian
counterparts.
It is difficult for Americans of color not to have their faith in
the United States Justice system challenged almost daily when we know
from experience that we are treated differently because of the color of
our skin.
Over the past few years, the practice of racial profiling has
received much more attention, in the media and elsewhere, than ever
before. This increased attention is, in some ways, a double-edged
sword. While it is satisfying to have our concerns and anecdotes
validated by state-sponsored studies and nationally recognized
newspapers, it is also frustrating that more is not being done to
address this insidious problem.
In Maryland, Florida, New Jersey and throughout this nation we have
the empirical evidence to validate the fact that racial profiling is a
common, even pervasive tool, of law enforcement officials at all
levels. Yet what has been done to change the way these law enforcement
officials perform their duties? Relatively little. In some ways,
admitting there is a problem but not having the political courage to
address it is even more frustrating to those of us who are stopped
while walking, driving, trying to board an airplane or sitting on a
park bench simply because of the color of our skin. It tells us that
the powers that be, the politicians and the justice system, still think
that people of color are, by nature, less trustful and it is therefore
okay to treat them with increased suspicion. It is degrading,
demoralizing, and in the end it will make it harder for us as a nation
to meet the challenges of the future together.
The legislation before Congress, S. 821 and H.R. 1443, is a small
step that nevertheless must be taken. We need a national study to try
to determine the depth of the problem. The studies that have been
conducted to date, while extremely helpful and illuminating, have all
been of sufficiently small scale that some may try to argue that they
reflect local biases or training.
I can tell you that in my capacity with the NAACP I have had cause
to travel throughout this nation and wherever I go, regardless of the
size of the crowd, there is invariably one person in every meeting who
has recently been stopped by an officer of the law simply because of
the color of his or her skin.
Racial profiling is a national problem, it occurs at all levels of
law enforcement in all corners of this nation, and it deserves--in
fact, it requires--a federal response.
I therefore urge the esteemed members of this subcommittee, and
indeed of this austere body, to act now to ensure that S. 821 becomes
law sooner rather than later. Let us begin to address racial profiling
in a real and concrete way, not simply with words.
In conclusion, I would like to reiterate a statement I made at the
beginning of my comments. It is difficult for Americans of color not to
have their faith in the United States Justice system challenged almost
daily when we know from experience that we are treated differently
because of the color of our skin. If Americans want our nation to
continue to lead the world economically, politically, and morally, we
must first make sure that our own moral fabric is not marred. We must
make sure that the words ``Equal Justice for All'' are practice, not
just words.
______
Prepared Statement of John Cohen, Director, Community Crime Fighting
Project, Progressive Policy Institute
Law enforcement agencies around the country are reassessing the
controversial tactic of racial profiling, in which police stop and
question people primarily due to their race. The Progressive Policy
Institute (PPI) believes it is time to end racial profiling and replace
it with innovative crime-fighting strategies that marry information
technology and community-oriented policing.
The following report, entitled Eliminating Racial Profiling: A
Third Way Approach, is a product of the new Community Crime Fighting
Project, whose mission is to modernize America's criminal justice
system by harnessing new technologies to progressive, community-based
strategies for preventing crime and improving public safety.
Eliminating Racial Profiling: A Third Way Approach challenges the
assumption that racial profiling is simply a matter of prejudice. But
it also demolishes the claim that profiling is an effective tool of law
enforcement. On the contrary, profiling is emblematic of an obsolete
style of ``random'' or ``reactive'' policing in which officers ride
around in cars awaiting emergency calls.
Instead of racial profiling, the police must do a better job of
criminal profiling--making timely use of information that links
suspects to actual crimes, not merely to statistical probabilities.
Since the most valuable information comes from people in crime-ridden
areas, tactics like racial profiling--which breed mistrust and outright
hostility between police and poor communities--are counterproductive.
To reduce crime and improve relations between minority communities and
the police, the paper proposes four key strategies:
Deploy technology more effectively. Develop and use
information technology systems to put accurate and timely
information about criminal activity in the hands of the police,
facilitating decision based on data instead of race.
Concentrate on ``hot spots.'' Crime is heavily concentrated
in specific geographic areas. Public Safety plans should be
coordinated and brought to bear on these ``hot spots.''
Focus on high-risk offenders. A relatively small number of
people are responsible for a majority of crimes. Crime fighters
need to target these dangerous people.
Improve police recruitment and training. Enhance the quality
of police forces with stringent hiring standards and train
officers to identify true indicators of criminal activity.
INTRODUTION
Until recently, African-American drivers on the New Jersey Turnpike
stood a much greater chance than white drivers of being stopped by the
State Police for a random drug search. This practice--an example of
racial profiling--ended abruptly last year when public outrage forced
the removal of the State Police Superintendent.
The outcome in New jersey was, however, the exception rather than
the rule. In fact, law enforcement agencies throughout the nation
commonly use tactics that subject members of certain minority groups to
closer scrutiny than others. When a police officer detains and
investigates a person or group of people primarily because of their
race--absent of any information linking them to criminal activity--that
officer is engaged in racial profiling.
For example, for several years, police have known that African-
American gang members from New York City fly to Florida to buy cocaine.
These gang members then use rental cars to transport the cocaine back
to various locations in the Northeastern United States. Aware of this
pattern, police officers from various agencies have adopted an
enforcement approach in which they select primarily cars driven by
African-American males traveling northbound on Interstate 95 to stop
and search for drugs. While these stops have occasionally led to
seizures of illegal drugs, they also resulted in individuals who are
not involved in illegal activity being stopped and detained.
Racial profiling is not limited to enforcement activities on the
highway. An African-American actor is presently suing the City of New
York following his arrest in the lobby of his apartment building. He
was arrested, along with five other African-American males, during a
police operation intended to arrest suspected drug dealers. The actor
was placed into custody for five hours and strip searched, even though
he was not in possession of any drugs or involved in any criminal
activity.
If racial profiling were a matter of simple bigotry, it would be
easy to condemn and ban. But law enforcement officials, including some
African-American police chiefs in big cities, defend such tactics as an
effective way to target their limited resources on likely lawbreakers.
They maintain that profiling is based not on prejudice but
probabilities--the statistical reality that young minority men are
disproportionately likely to commit (and be the victim of) crimes.
Citing these facts, the courts have repeatedly upheld the
constitutionality of routinely using race as a criteria for selecting
the targets of enforcement action.
Of course, there are situations in which police must take race or
ethnicity into account to do their jobs effectively. An obvious example
is when skin color is part of a description of specific suspects
committing specific crimes. In addition, such descriptions help police
narrow the pool of potential suspects and concentrate their enforcement
efforts. Let's say that a police department has knowledge that jewelry
store salespeople are being robbed. The robberies occur just after the
store closes when the sales personnel are leaving work. Witnesses
describe the suspects as male, Hispanic adults. Police are also told
that prior to past robberies, witnesses have observed several Hispanic
males seated in a car that matches the description of what is later to
be determined as the suspect vehicle. Based on this scenario, a police
officer would be justified in investigating a vehicle containing a
group of Hispanic males parked adjacent to a jewelry store at closing
time. And even though the criteria used by police to target this
vehicle includes that the occupants are Hispanic, the police are not
using ``racial profiling.'' However, if police officers from this
department--in an effort to stop these robberies--made it a practice to
stop any and all vehicles occupied by male Hispanics, anywhere in the
city, at any time, they would be engaged in racial profiling.
The well-founded belief that authorities use racial profiles to
justify more intensive observation and questioning of people of color
has fed escalating tensions between police and minority communities.
Racial profiling has triggered widespread complaints among minority
men, including many middle-class professionals, of police harassment
based solely on their skin color.
Political opposition to racial profiling is mounting. President
Clinton recently called the practice ``morally indefensible'' and order
federal law enforcement officials to collect information on the race
and sex of people they stop. Vice President Al Gore and his rival for
the Democratic nomination, former Sen. Bill Bradley, have promised to
ban racial profiling by federal authorities.
Progressives should press for an end to profiling on both civic and
practical grounds. First, racial profiling corrodes the presumption of
innocence to which all American citizens are entitled. It is always
dangerous to stray from the bedrock liberal principle that individuals
must be judged on their own merits, not on their class, race, ethnic
background, or gender. Second, whatever gains the police may reap from
profiling are overwhelmed by its costs: alienating law-abiding citizens
and reinforcing the view in poor communities of the police as an
occupying force rather than a common instrument for self-defense.
Moreover, police now have an alternative: new, community-based
strategies buttressed by real time access to information that can help
them target people who have actually committed crimes as opposed to
people who happen to be members of racial or ethnic minorities. After
all, profiling uses race as a proxy for criminal intent or culpability
because police often lack specific information about specific
individuals. Modern information systems and strong police community
interaction that foster the exchange of information will ensure that
police make decisions based on facts and data instead of race.
The problem with racial profiling is not that it targets
``dangerous people in dangerous places.'' It is that it targets
inaccurately and in ways that breed resentment and mistrust between the
police and poor communities. What we need is the right kind of
targeting, based on better information about lawbreakers and closer
cooperation between the police and the community. In this paper, we
propose a Third Way: replace racial profiling with new tools that will
help the police to make better judgments, deploy their resources more
strategically, and most important of all, enlist citizens in crime-
riddled neighborhoods in their own self-defense.
Specifically, we propose strategies to:
Deploy information technology more effectively. We must
develop and deploy information technology systems to put
accurate, timely information about the location of criminal
activity and the people involved in it in the hands of cops on
the street, permitting them to make decisions based on data
instead of race. The technology exists to dramatically improve
the collection, processing, and spreading of information within
the entire criminal justice system, but it has not been
deployed. These same advances can make it easier for citizens
to provide police with information about crime-related
problems.
Concentrate on ``hot spots.'' Our crime-fighting strategies
should recognize and respond to the well-documented fact that
crime, and especially violent crime, is heavily concentrated in
certain geographic areas. The actions of police, prosecutors,
parole officers--indeed, every aspect of the criminal justice
system--should be coordinated and brought to bear on these
crime ``hot spots.''
Focus on high-risk offenders. A relatively small number of
people are responsible for a majority of crimes. As in ``hot
spots,'' we need to target the criminal justice system's full
panoply of resources on these dangerous people.
Improve police recruitment and training. We need to enhance
the quality of our police forces with more stringent hiring
standards and train officers to identify the conditions,
trends, and behaviors that are true indicators of criminal
activity.
RACE AND LAW ENFORCEMENT
In the early part of this century, racial discrimination was
codified in many state laws and the police were expected to enforce
what most Americans today regard as unjust laws. Over the past three
decades, there have been systematic efforts to eliminate blatant
bigotry from the nation's criminal justice system. Outright
discrimination is clearly much less prevalent than in the past.
Nonetheless, there are still many Americans, particularly racial and
ethnic minorities, who are convinced that police unfairly target them.
Undoubtedly, there are still people in our criminal justice system
who are influenced by racial or ethnic prejudice. Just as surely, some
instances of profiling, or of excessive force, can be attributed to a
racist outlook. When racial prejudice prevents anyone in the criminal
justice system from treating all citizens in a fair and equal manner,
the only solution is to remove such people from positions of public
trust.
But the routine use of racial profiling today has more to do with
techniques of ``modern'' policing than old-fashioned bias. In the
middle part of this century, police officials instituted a new model of
``professional policing'' in an effort to deal with corruption. Under
this model, police officers were taken off the streets and placed in
radio-dispatched patrol cars, controlled and monitored from a
centralized location. Officers were responsible for large geographical
areas and were evaluated based on such performance measures as number
of arrests, number of calls for service handled, and response times.
Departments became 911 driven, and officers were discouraged from
forming close bonds with the community. The result: police officers
became detached from the communities they served.
Today, many police departments (even many of those that promote
community-oriented policing) still emphasize random or reactive
tactics. Rarely do police officers (or their supervisors) begin their
day with a specific problem to solve and a defined, information-driven
solution to that problem. Generally, police officers randomly drive
around a loosely defined beat area, responding to calls for service, or
using a set of nonspecific criteria to decide which people and cars to
stop. This culture of random policing has alienated police from the
communities they are charged with protecting, fostering an ``us vs.
them'' mentality in which racial profiling and charges of racially-
inspired police brutality flourish.
The authors of this paper know from personal experience that most
police officers are hard-working, decent people who are struggling to
be effective with minimal resources and under difficult conditions.
They are held accountable for preventing crime, but they are seldom
provided up-to-date information regarding crime trends and conditions
influencing crime. This operational environment requires police
officers to make discretionary judgments about who to stop and when to
detain people. Lacking reliable information and sometimes training in
how to establish proper ``probably cause,'' officers often rely on
``hunches'' or other superficial criteria--such as a minority person
traveling in ``the wrong neighborhood''--to justify detaining and
questioning an individual. They believe that they are making a rational
decision based on their experience; that they are simply doing their
job.
Some legal and law enforcement experts argue that the use of racial
profiling is an effective method of strategically addressing specific
crime problems. They believe that the most effective use of their
limited resources is to focus on minorities because they are
statistically more likely to be involved in crime. They further argue
that racial profiling is appropriate when the race of an individual is
one of a number of legitimate factors used by police to decide whom to
stop and question.
Yet their core premise--that racial profiling is an effective and
efficient way to catch criminals--is fatally flawed. When police use
race-based profile resources, they often devote time and attention to
individuals who are not involved in illegal activity--leaving actual
criminals free to continue committing crimes. Assuming that all members
of a race are legitimate targets for police action because they have
the same skin color as individuals engaged in criminal activity is not
a sound assumption on which to base an enforcement strategy.\1\ The
vast majority of serial killers are white. Yet no one would argue that
because all white people are potentially serial killers, they should be
subject to random police stops. From a law enforcement perspective, the
use of race is not the most effective method for deciding whether a
person may be potentially violating the law.
Tough law enforcement does not require that the police treat some
citizens unfairly. Indeed, some of the most effective community-
oriented policing initiatives combine the goal of curbing crime with a
commitment to treat every person with the utmost respect, regardless of
the circumstances. Communities that have embraced this philosophy of
policing have not only realized dramatic reductions in crime, they've
also seen citizen complaints against the police plummet. San Diego, for
example, has achieved a reduction in crime statistically equal to that
achieved in New York City through a crime strategy based on problem
solving and community mobilization. Rochester, NY, has adopted an
aggressive crime reduction strategy with a commitment by the chief of
police that every citizen will be treated with maximum respect.
Rochester also has witnessed both a substantial reduction in crime and
in citizen complaints. Reducing Crime and Ending Racial Profiling--A
Third Way To Approach Racial Profiling is inconsistent with the basic
freedoms and rights afforded in our democracy. It erodes the foundation
of trust between communities and public authorities. Worst of all, it
inflames racial and ethnic strife and undermines America's progress
toward color-blind justice.
Improving the relationship between minority groups and police is
one of the greatest challenges confronting our criminal justice system.
According to Washington, D.C., Police Chief Charles Ramsey, ``Race
relations between the police and the community is one of the
fundamental things that we must work through and `get right' if we are
to have any hope of significant and lasting progress on stopping
illegal drugs, reducing youth crime, and improving public safety.''
Acknowledging the gravity of this problem, U.S. Attorney General Janet
Reno and police executives from throughout the country have held three
recent meetings on the subject of profiling and race relations. But no
clear strategy has emerged for resolving this complex issue.
Without community support, tougher law enforcement can only go so
far. If we are to make deeper inroads into crime, we must employ
enforcement strategies that treat all law-abiding Americans with
respect. We also must move beyond police tactics that have officers
driving or walking around at random hoping to find crime, or stopping
people or cars based solely on ``hunches.'' There is growing evidence
that communities can reap significant decreases in crime when police
work closely with community members (business leaders, clergy and
residents) to identify local conditions that breed disorder and to
craft information-driven strategies to prevent crime.
In addition to the overriding imperative of better community
support, the progressive alternative to racial profiling is based on
the following four key strategies.
Use Technology to Enable the Police and Increase Citizen Participation
Whether in an inner city neighborhood or on an interstate highway,
the use of accurate and timely information allows police to identify
both the location of criminal activity and the people involved in it.
Information plays a key role in the identification of ``hot spots'' and
the repeat offenders that the criminal justice system should target. If
state troopers have information about specific people or vehicles
involved in the transportation of illegal drugs, they will not have to
rely on race or ethnic profiles.
Advances in technology promise to significantly change the way we
address crime in our cities, towns, and on our highways. The
information technology revolution has improved the ability of people in
the criminal justice system to collect, process, and disseminate
information. Linked information systems, wireless data technology, and
systems that link the community with police will provide police the
critical information needed to identify trends and situations that
demand law enforcement focus. Police officers can now access
information and images of persons who are wanted for crimes via laptop
computers in their police cars. Additionally, officers can use these
same laptops to file reports and complete other administrative tasks.
This allows them to stay in the field longer. Information and
communication systems will link regional agencies and enable multi-
agency efforts to target the locations where crimes occur and the
people who commit them. The same information systems also can monitor
the performance of police officers, highlighting patterns of behavior
that may signal bad decision-making.
These advances will make it easier for citizens to provide
information to police regarding crime-related problems. For example,
some police departments are using the Internet to enable people to file
police reports and to get information regarding criminal activity in
their neighborhoods. Other departments are using advanced
telecommunications technology in conjunction with an easy-to-remember,
non-emergency number (311) to improve the response to both emergency
and non-emergency calls for service, and to create discretionary time
for community-oriented policing.
Unfortunately, the criminal justice community has been slow to
exploit the full potential of the new technologies. Many agencies can't
afford cutting edge technology; others have senior executives who don't
grasp how technology can leverage existing criminal justice resources
toward more effective policing. The federal government should launch an
educational campaign to raise awareness among federal, state, and local
criminal justice agencies about what new information tools are
available and how they can be a ``force multiplier'' for police.
Concentrate on Crime ``Hot Spots''
Research confirms what Americans instinctively understand: crime is
heavily concentrated in certain geographical locations. A small number
of addresses tend to generate a large amount of crime, and these
addresses tend to be clustered in particular neighborhoods. Some
studies have indicated that as much as 50 percent of all crime occurs
at about 3 percent of addresses. For violent crime, this concentration
is even more pronounced. The pattern holds true for urban, rural, and
suburban settings. It is therefore crucial for law enforcement
authorities and community leaders to cooperate in targeting resources
on those hot spots where most crime takes place. Efforts by police and
prosecutors to target hot spots should also be coordinated with other
public and community agencies, such as those responsible for after
school programs, housing, and drug treatment. Maryland Lt. Governor
Kathleen Kennedy Townsend has spearheaded a statewide ``HotSpots''
program that should be a model for the nation. State grants initially
supported 36 multi agency and community-based efforts to reclaim the
neighborhoods hardest hit by crime and drugs. The state assists crime-
ridden communities in developing a comprehensive strategy that includes
community mobilization, community-oriented policing, community
probation,\2\ and delinquency prevention.
This information-driven approach has had dramatic results. HotSpot
locations recorded significant decreases in serious crime that doubled
both national and state averages, leading Maryland to double the number
of HotSpots communities that receive state funds.\3\
Focus on High-Risk Offenders
Research also has shown that a small proportion of high-risk
offenders accounts for a large proportion of crime. An exhaustive study
of career criminals conducted by the National Academy of Sciences found
that while half of all offenders commit more than one crime per year,
10 percent of offenders committed over 100 crimes per year. A study in
Baltimore found that almost 60 percent of adults arrested are on some
type of criminal justice supervision (probation and parole) at the time
of their arrest.
Incredibly, however, many police departments continue to employ
crime control strategies that involve the random search for people
committing crime when it is clear that the majority of crime is
committed by individuals who are not only well known to the law
enforcement community, but who are also under criminal justice
supervision.
Some jurisdictions have realized impressive reductions in crime by
targeting these high-risk individuals. Boston, for example, quelled a
severe epidemic of youth violence with a multi-faceted approach
involving government and the community. The police identified violence-
prone youth, who were then contacted as well by social workers,
probation officers, and church leaders. These youths quickly discovered
that they were being closely monitored not only by law enforcement
officials, but by a caring community. Coupled with this initiative was
an expanded gun enforcement effort to track down those who were selling
guns to youths. The results were impressive. For two years, there were
no gun related homicides committed against or by a person under the age
of 18. Additionally, Boston substantially reduced its level of youth
violence through these collaborative initiatives.
A success like Boston's shows that it is not only assertive police
action that can reduce disorder and violence. Community-backed
approaches work better than reliance solely on police action.
Strengthen Police Training and Accountability
Police officers hired to protect our communities must recognize
that treating citizens with respect is the highest priority of the
profession. Police departments must redouble efforts to screen
applicants for this ability and eliminate those who lack it. While
hiring requirements should be set locally based on the specific needs
of specific communities, departments across the nation are exploring
residency \4\ and mandatory education requirements as ways to enhance
the quality of their law enforcement officers.
Many police agencies have begun requiring an associate's degree as
a minimum academic credential while others require or offer signing and
retention bonuses for people with bachelor's degrees. It is generally
agreed that applicants with higher levels of education have better
communications skills and show greater versatility in problem-solving.
However, such requirements often make it difficult to recruit minority
officers, since there is intense competition in the job market for
minority candidates with college degrees.
Law enforcement agencies traditionally have tended to recruit
college students majoring in criminal justice or criminology. Many
police agencies will also provide continuing education benefits to
their officers only for criminal justice studies. To widen the pool of
potential recruits, law enforcement should look also to students with a
broader educational focus.
Everywhere, the quality of police training must be dramatically
improved. Law enforcement professionals must be trained to identify
conditions, trends, and behaviors that are true indicators of criminal
activity. They must also be trained to understand and articulate the
cornerstone principles of American justice, such as the doctrine of
probable cause. Police training must focus on improving the quality of
decisionmaking and use of discretion. We must invest more in innovative
training techniques, such as interactive software programs that present
trainees with scenarios and evaluate their reactions.
Police executives must be willing to bring minority representatives
into full collaboration as they develop policies and programs aimed at
lessening racial tension. Police strategies and tactics should be
developed with community input, so the community is aware of what
objectives are being sought and how the strategies will work. Police
must not only tell the community what they are doing, but must learn
what true collaboration means. Community oversight boards and federal
supervision over local police focus attention on this issue but do not
foster collaboration and therefore, in themselves, are not the answer.
Most importantly, we must remember that this is not just a problem for
police. Federal, state, and local government officials (in the
legislative and executive branches) must provide the leadership, the
ideas, and the commitment needed to spark a new revolution in criminal
justice practices, learning from what has been successful and
abandoning strategies that have failed.
Finally, leadership matters. Racial tensions between the police and
communities are low where police executives take a strong stand against
discriminatory or biased actions and hold their police officers
strictly accountable when they violate such strictures. Police officers
will not become involved in situations that increase racial tensions if
police managers make it clear that inappropriate police behavior will
not be tolerated.
CONCLUSION
Today's welcome reduction in crime allow many Americans to feel
safer in their communities. Yet some Americans--particularly
minorities--live with fear daily, not just of crime but also of abuse
at the hands of police.
A progressive anti-crime strategy, therefore, should strive toward
two key aims: reducing crime and improving relations between minority
communities and the police. Fortunately, these goals are compatible and
mutually reinforcing. There is simply no need for Americans to choose
between greater public safety and policing methods that fail to treat
all citizens with equal respect. It is, therefore, time to end racial
profiling and replace it with information-driven strategies--enabled by
the new tools of technology and grounded in strong community support--
that constitute a Third Way approach to public safety for the 21st
century.
AUTHORS
John D. Cohen is director of PPI's Community Crime Fighting
Project. A former police officer and White House policy advisor, Mr.
Cohen is president and CEO of PSComm, LLC, a strategic marketing and
consulting firm that advises police and other law enforcement agencies.
Janet J. Lennon is an attorney in New York and serves as adjunct
professor at Pace University, advisor to the Metropolitan Black Bar
Association, and director for the Bedford Stuyvesant Legal Services
Corporation. Ms. Lennon previously served as both a deputy commissioner
and as special counsel to the police commissioner in the New York City
Police Department, and has held various prosecutorial positions in New
York. Ms. Lennon is also a former president of the National Black
Prosecutors Association.
Robert Wasserman is chairman of PSComm, LLC, and also serves as
senior international law enforcement advisor to the U.S. Department of
State. Mr. Wasserman has over 20 years of law enforcement experience,
and has held numerous executive-level appointed and consulting
positions within international and American law enforcement agencies
including the United Nations, the White House Office of National Drug
Control Policy, the New York City Police Department, and the
Massachusetts Port Authority.
ENDNOTES
1. A recent report released by the National Institute of Justice
found that it is the social and economic status of a neighborhood, not
the racial or ethnic makeup, that is a key contributor to a community's
subculture of crime and violence.
2. Community prosecution involves having prosecutors focus their
activities based on the location of a crime, not the type of crime.
Under community prosecution, a prosecutor will have responsibility for
working with police and community members to solve problems and
prosecute most arrests for crimes in that community.
3. From July through December 1998, Baltimore City, HotSpots
reported a 31 percent decrease in serious crime as compared to an 11
percent decrease citywide. Statewide, for the same period, HotSpots
reported a 20 percent decrease in crime compared to a 10 percent
decrease in non-HotSpots.
4. Calls for police officers to live in the communities they police
tend to reflect the desire for police officers to show greater
sensitivity to community issues and concerns. However, others believe
that the quality of policing is important, not where the officer
resides. In addition, residency requirements make police recruitment
more difficult, and are subject to various state laws that prohibit
this criterion.
______
Prepared Statement of Trent and Kelly Jackson
As I begin to write to all of you who might read this letter, my
eyes swell up with tears for I am almost at loss as to where to begin.
The problem of racial profiling has always been something my husband
and I have wanted to help make the public aware of--for ourselves but
most importantly for the people who cannot speak for fear of their
lives. We only wish we had more than a couple of hours to write this
letter to you but we will do our best to explain briefly the corruption
we have experienced within the law enforcement agencies due to racial
issues.
My husband, Trent Jackson, is a 33-year-old African-American. From
the material we sent, you will see that he is not only a successful
black male in society's terms but that he is a man of integrity and a
true leader in his community. He is full of charisma and is a favorite
for local television and radio interviews as well as public speaking
engagements nationally. Some of you should remember him as a basketball
player for the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1985 to 1989.
Trent is fortunate that he has lived the life that he has when it
comes to the problems he personally has had with the law enforcement
agencies. It has made his experiences a great deal less dramatic than
his fellow African-Americans who live in the inner city but Trent is
still terrified of the police. I am also scared. I am afraid that one
day he could be accused of something he never did, beaten, or even
killed. These thoughts will be justified when you read some of Trent's
personal experiences.
Also, I would like to inform you that I am a 31-year-old white
female and have worked as a model internationally as you will also see
from the material that was sent. The reason that this information is
pertinent is because we believe some of the incidents have happened
because we are a ``mixed'' couple.
As my husband and I recalled some of the many racial profiling
incidents that have happened to him, we can guarantee one thing--that
racial profiling is not made of isolated incidents. It happens all over
the country and it is no prejudice of the size of the law enforcement
agency.
Follwing is a list of some of the racial profiling incidents:
1. One day Trent had dropped me off for an hour at my
modeling agency in downtown Chicago and went around the block
to White Hen pantry to buy a newspaper to read. He was stalled
by cashiers long enough for two policemen to come through the
doors and arrest him. They pushed him into their squad car and
handcuffed him to the bar while they checked his license. At
the time, I believe we were living in Miami. Apparently, the
White Hen pantry has been robbed a few days earlier and what do
you know, the police and the cashier thought their burglar had
returned to the store.(?) They eventually let him go but were
extremely rude with no apologies--the usual treatment for a
black male.
2. Another incident with the Chicago police was when were
were living in the Gold Coast district of Chicago which if you
don't know, is an expensive part of town. Trent was walking
back to our condominium by himself carrying a bag of food when
the Chicago police paddy wagon drove up to him and asked him
what he was doing in that district. They then begin to provoke
him with racial remarks and obscenities.
3. In Madison, Wisconsin, Trent was again waiting in the car
for me at a modeling agency late one night. They asked him to
get out of his car, questioned him about whose car it was,
searched it, and did the usual harassing. (This was about 12
years ago when they didn't know who he was.)
4. When we were living in Miami, we lived on an island called
Bay Harbor Island, where once again Trent was harrassed because
the police did not believe he lived there. He would be stopped
for no apparent reason except for the police to search the car
and harrass him. This happened numerous times. One time he was
stopped and issued a speeding ticket even though he wasn't
speeding. It was an excuse to check the car he was driving.
This police officer threatened to plant drugs on him . . .
5. One time in Miami, Trent was waiting in the car while I
ran upstairs to an apartment room of a photographer and his
assistant to pick up my pictures. I returned to the car with
the photographer's assistant (Rich) to find Trent with his
hands up on the top of the car with two policemen's gun pointed
at him. Our friend Rich, had reported a burglary of his
photographic equipment the day before and the police once again
acted as if they believed that the ``burglars'' would return to
the place of the crime and actually sit in their car in front
of the building. As it is needless to say how Trent felt, Rich
was furious because he told them it was two men and Trent was
nothing near the description of either one.(?)
6. Two weeks ago in Santa Barbara, California, Trent and I
were vacationing and visiting my biological father and his
family. One day, Trent drove my father's red Volvo downtown and
dropped me off at a store and told me he would wait around the
block. A few minutes later, a policeman pulled him over and
questioned him about whose car it was,etc. After checking
everything out, he then issued Trent a ticket for not wearing
his seatbelt while Trent sat there with his seatbelt on. Trent
pleaded with him for his reasoning for this ticket and he said
that he saw him let a young lady out of the car and that he
wasn't wearing a seatbelt at that time which was of course not
true. Basically, we believe that this was a case where the
police officer saw that I was white, etc. and wanted to harrass
him and since he need a reason for pulling him over, he issued
him a ticket that was inaccurate.
We could gone on and on but it is late and I am sure that these
examples are enough. In the future, Trent would welcome the chance to
speak directly to all of you about his experiences.
In summary, we desperately urge everyone to help pass the long
overdue bill on racial profiling. This is a huge problem that needs to
be addressed immediately to help save the innocent lives of minorities
and provide more security for them when they are face-to-face with the
law enforcement personnel.
On a personal note, I pray that one day my husband will feel safe
when he has to reach into the glove compartment for identification. I
pray that he will be treated with the same dignity and respect as other
law-abiding citizens regardless of color--that he will not be demeaned
in front of his family. I pray that one day the personality of the
police force will not be the first determining factor when we choose
our place of residence.
______
Police Reign of Terror Must End
(By Civil Rights Activist--Karen Murphy-Smith)
For one reason or another, citizens here have put up with some bad,
coarsened, derelict, Law Enforcement Officers (LEOs) from the Milwaukee
Police Department and surrounding Municipal Police Agencies. Instead of
safeguarding the lives and property of citizens--these LEOs bring
injury to the innocent, violating their liberties and constitutional
rights. They stray away from the Law Enforcement Code of Ethics
bringing animosity, prejudices, and pre-conceived ethnic notions to
their perspective agencies.
We'll have discourteous LEOs, police brutality, Driving While Black
or Brown (DWB), racial profiling and other atrocities as long as:
(1) Good LEOs who witness these atrocities choose not to
``blow-the-whistle'';
(2) Citizens take a ``see no evil, hear no evil, speak no
evil'' attitude when asked for help;
(3) Some Social Justice and Civil Rights Organizations remain
slothful to act on citizen's complaints;
(4) The Citizen Complaint Process is cumbersome, lengthy, and
expensive; and
(5) Less than 2% of Milwaukee area Attorney's take-on Police
Departments.
The bottom-line they'll continue to reign terror as long as
we let them. It's up to us to hold them accountable to a
standard of their own choosing the Law Enforcement Code of
Ethics. Most citizens are familiar with the Law Enforcement
Code of Ethics, which states:
``As a law enforcement officer, my fundamental duty is to
serve mankind to safeguard lives and property to protect the
innocent against deception, the weak against violence or
disorder, and to respect the constitutional rights of all men
to liberty, equality and justice.
``I will keep my private life unsullied as an example to all;
maintain courageous calm in the face of danger, scorn, or
ridicule; develop self-restraint; and be constantly mindful of
the welfare of others. Honest in thought and deed in both my
personal and official life, I will be exemplary in obeying the
laws of the land and the regulations of my department. Whatever
I see or hear of a confidential nature or that is confided in
me in my official capacity will be kept ever secret unless
revelation is necessary in the performance of my duty.
``I will never act officiously or permit personal feelings,
prejudices, animosities or friendships to influence my
decisions. With no compromise for crime and with relentless
prosecution of criminals, I will enforce the law courteously
and appropriately without fear or favor, malice or ill will,
never employing unnecessary force or violence and never
accepting gratuities.
``I recognize the badge of my office as a symbol of public
faith, and I accept it as a public trust to be held so long as
I am true to the ethics of the police service. I will
constantly strive to my chosen profession--law enforcement.''
It's beyond me how a LEO can swear by the Law Enforcement
Code of Ethics and commit crimes against humanity like some we
have documented.
--A Black Family return home to find three White Burglars.
The Family called the Milwaukee Police Department (MPD). When
the Police arrived, instead of arresting the three Burglars,
the Police pushed and shoved the Daughter around. When the
Father went to his Daughter's aid, both the Police and two of
the Burglars beat the Father into unconsciousness. Police let
the Burglars go free and arrested and charged the Family.
--A Black Woman and her Niece drove down a north-side street
when they were pulled over by the Milwaukee Police Department
(MPD). The car was surrounded. Two Policeman approached the car
shouting obscenities and literally put guns to the women's
heads. After about an half hour, the Women were offered no
explanation and allowed to drive away.
--A Black Teen and his 8-year old brother drove home one
night from an athletic event. The Teen noticed that his
headlight was broken and put on his 4-way flashers. A Glendale,
WI Policeman stopped the car on north Green Bay Road. The
Glendale Policeman ticketed the Teen and made the Brothers walk
to the Glendale Police Department in the dark, where the Teen
called his Mother.
--A Black Woman was driving home from her job in Mequon, WI
and listening to her car radio one morning. As she stopped at a
light she noticed that a Mequon Police squad was there too.
While laughing out loud at (Ms. Leonard--a character on WKKV-
100 FM Radio Doug Banks' Show), she glanced into the Mequon
Police squad and saw the Policeman pick his nose. When the
light turned green she continued on her way. A half block down
the road the Woman was pulled over by that Mequon Policeman who
asked her, ``What was so funny back there at the light?''
--A Black Man and his Cousin went out to a nightclub in
Waukesha, WI. ``Calling It A Night'' the Cousin went out to
start the car as the Man grabbed his coat. Once outside the Man
heard a verbal argument between his Cousin and another Patron.
The Man was breaking-up the altercation, when he was rushed by
several Waukesha Policemen who beat him with night-sticks,
arrested him and jailed him after taking him to an area
hospital for treatment of injuries he sustained during the
beating. The Man was later released but was hospitalized for an
additional three days.
An ex-police officer posted the following related to this
subject on a newsgroup http://thebird.org/copwatch/
linkcop.html:
``I am an ex-police officer. I am ex because I tried my best
to live up to the standards that the code of ethics tries to
spell out. I was shunned by other officers. I was told to
arrest `racial expletives deleted' instead of `bothering' the
townspeople. I loved my job dearly but had to leave due to
harassment from other officers. I am sure there are many good
officers and good departments out there. But when you are
dealing with something as precious as a persons rights and
their very lives there should be zero tolerance for anyone who
puts on a badge and gun and doesn't want to `protect and
serve'. I am hopeful someday I may return to my chosen
profession but have been blackballed so far. I will keep trying
since I believe serving the public, regardless of race or sex
or religion is worth it. Thanks for letting me put in my two
cents worth.''
For these reasons, the Angela Davis Cop Watch and Campaign Against
Racial Profiling is planning a May 20th Public Speak-Out Hearing. The
goal of which is to mobilize citizens to present testimony and evidence
of police brutality, racial profiling, Driving While Black or Brown,
and other atrocities to national and international organizations like:
Amnesty International, the Ad hoc Coalition Against Racism and Police
Brutality, the Civil Rights Commission (Midwestern Region), the Black
Radical Congress, the United Council of University of Wisconsin
Students, the National Association For The Advancement of Colored
People, Rep. John Conyers, U.S. Vice President Gore, U.S. Attorney
General Reno, the National Institute of Justice, the Bureau of Justice
Statistics, the Police Complaint Center, the National Police
Accountability Project, and the Rainbow Push Coalition.
______
National Black Police Association,
Washington, DC, March 29, 2000.
Senator Russell Feingold,
Senate Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on the Constitution,
Federalism and Property Rights, Senate Dirksen Office Bldg.,
Washington, DC.
Dear Senator Feingold: The National Black Police Association is an
advocacy organization that represents over 35,000 African-American men
and women in Law Enforcement and other areas of the Criminal Justice
System. Also, the National Black Police Association is involved in the
examination and analysis of criminal justice policy and practices that
have negative impact on African-American law enforcement and the
communities they serve.
The National Black Police Association would like to express its
support for your Bill S. 821, that will provide for the collection of
data on traffic stops. ``The Traffic Stops Statistics Study Act of
1999'' will provide us with information we need to properly examine the
issue of whether or not people of color are victims of racist law
enforcement officers or polices.
In closing, the National Black Police Association supports S. 821
without any reservation and is looking forward to working with you for
its passage.
Sincerely,
Ronald E. Hampton,
Executive Director.