By Randy Tucker
Enquirer staff writer

An entrance to Cincinnati Mills, where a shopper said authorities used a dress code to target African-American youths because of their race. (Meggan Booker photo)

Legal experts say Cincinnati Mills was within its rights when it enforced a code of conduct banning tilted ball caps and other gang-signifying attire.

Mall officials sent out an apology over the weekend to shoppers who believe they were victims of racial profiling by security guards enforcing the code.

But Cincinnati attorney Scott Greenwood says the mall is private property and can enforce a dress code as long as it doesn't discriminate in enforcing the code.

The mall's apology stems from an encounter Aug. 20 between mall security guards and Miami University sophomore Donald Jefferson, who complained that authorities used the code to target him and other African-American youth because of their race.

"We apologize that a misunderstanding has occurred and that some members of the community have felt that they have been singled out," Mills' general manager Jim Childress said in a statement. "This was certainly not our intent."

The apology did little to appease Jefferson, an 18-year-old sophomore from Bond Hill.

"They're just trying to save face because of the bad publicity," Jefferson said Monday from Oxford. "They want people to believe that they're not profiling. But if you open a mall and institute profiling from the very start, you've already established a very clear agenda on how you want to run your mall."

Code of conduct

Jefferson said he was stopped by mall security Aug. 20 - just a day after the former Forest Fair Mall officially reopened to the public as Cincinnati Mills - and asked to straighten his ball cap, which he was wearing tilted to the side.

He was then handed a slip of paper with the conduct code that prohibits "apparel which is likely to provoke a disturbance or embroil other groups or general public in open conflict."

Mall officials said the security guards stopped Jefferson shortly after he entered the mall because they had been informed by local law enforcement that tilted caps could indicate gang affiliation and lead to violent outbreaks inside the mall.

But Jefferson and others, including several white patrons, said it appeared to them that only black youths were being approached by security and handed the conduct codes, even though he said he saw white teen-agers sporting the same tilted-hat fashions.

Not true, according to mall officials who insist their security staff was instructed to enforce the policy even-handedly, regardless of age, race or gender.

"I had a World War II veteran in here the other day, and we had to ask him to straighten his hat," Childress said last week.

Still, to avoid any future appearance of impropriety, the mall says it will now enforce the code based on disruptive behavior - not dress - although the code will remain intact.

That includes the article in the code referring to apparel, Childress said.

"The code is going to remain the same, but folks need to know that our focus is going to be enforcing the behavior aspect," Childress said.

Supreme Court case

Legal experts agree that it's well within the mall owners' rights to enforce a conduct code, whether shoppers approve or not.

In 1972, the Supreme Court ruled in Lloyd v. Tanner that shopping centers were considered private entities and could therefore establish guidelines for dress and conduct on their premises.

At the same time, however, civil rights law prohibits private entities from discriminating against patrons on the basis of race.

"You can't have a policy intended to keep young black males away, and you can't assume that because they dress in a certain way that they are gang members," said Greenwood, a civil liberties expert.

"As soon as they start drawing inferences from the way people dress, then they are creating a scenario in which allegations of racial profiling are bound to arise."

That's one of the reasons most malls in Greater Cincinnati and elsewhere have shied away from enforcing dress codes - certain clothing styles, especially so-called "hip-hop" and "gangsta" fashions, are closely associated with African-American youth.

David Casper, marketing manager at Kenwood Towne Centre, said that while some teen fashions may seem distasteful or even intimidating to those unfamiliar with contemporary urban styles, identifying youths as potential trouble-makers because of their clothes is simply unreliable.

"Behavior is a much stronger indicator of the intentions of your guests," he said. "You can't tell anything by the clothes they're wearing."

E-mail rtucker@enquirer.com