Tuesday, February 01, 2000
Chief acknowledges racial profiling
Legislation, programs aimed at curbing practice
BY TANYA ALBERT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
There have been incidents of Cincinnati police pulling people over simply because the color of their skin, and chances are it will happen again, Cincinnati Police Chief Thomas Streicher Jr. said Monday night.
“Yes, it does occur,” he told a crowd of several hundred people gathered at Mount Auburn Presbyterian Church for a community forum on “Driving While Black.” “All I can do is ask for forgiveness for transgressions in the past.”
Chief Streicher said the department must address public concerns. He said the department continues to make strides with a risk-management program that requires ethical decision-making and emphasises training and supervision.
His comments came in the context of a state and national discussion on how to address the issue of racial profiling. Police agencies sometimes use race or ethnicity as a basis for stopping drivers for traffic offenses when they really are looking for criminals such as drug traffickers.
Ohio State Rep. Peter Lawson Jones, D-Shaker Heights, is sponsoring a bill that would require police to track the race, sex and age of motorists they stop and ticket. Similar legislation is proposed at the federal level.
If legislation is passed, it would provide a way to gather statistics that aren't being collected and analyzed now.
Once the statistics are there, it could change the police practice of pulling people over based on race, Mr. Jones said Monday night. Action could be taken against departments or officers who stop people because of their race, he said. The law itself also should be a deterrent to avoid profiling, he added.
“There are some people who don't believe racial profiling occurs,” said Mr. Jones. “It is a reality. We need to collect these statistics. ... It would help to rebuild the public faith.”
People who have gathered statistics in recent years say they have numbers that show racial profiling is a problem, particularly for blacks.
A study that University of Toledo law professor David Harris released last year based on court records found that blacks driving in the Toledo, Akron, Dayton and Columbus areas were twice as likely to get tickets as nonblacks — whites, Hispanics and other ethnic groups. Mr. Harris also says an even higher percentage of black motorists are stopped but not ticketed. But police agencies don't keep records by race if a citation is not issued.
Studies in Maryland, New Jersey and Texas had similar findings.
“This is real and you can measure it,” he said, drawing applause from the crowd gathered for the event sponsored by the League of Women Voters of the Cincinnati Area and the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio, Southwest Chapter.
But not everyone supports the legislation proposed in Ohio.
“It looks like a fairly lengthy report has to be written,” Fraternal Order of Police President Keith Fangman said. “It's that much more the officer is taken off the beat.”
In more than 100 cities where police agencies are collecting racial statistics, officials have found that record-keeping is not cumbersome, Mr. Harris said.
Some residents who participated in Monday's discussion, though, say legislation is the answer. And they said they are encouraged to hear Chief Streicher acknowledge that there is a problem.
“The smart thing he did was admit that no organization is perfect,” said Neze Tate, 78, of East Walnut Hills, who shook the chief's hand after the discussion. “He acknowledged that it has happened in the past and it will happen in the future.”
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