|
Racial profiling in
the Twin Cities
In the past few years, racial profiling has become a popular political buzzword. Even President Clinton recently addressed the subject in his last five days in office, during a speech on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. He did so in a plea he sent to Congress promoting his racial reconciliation policies. Locally, however, the effects of this racist practice were illustrated, as a six-month study of the subject was completed this past year monitoring the traffic-stopping habits of the Minneapolis and St. Paul police departments. The results were released earlier this month, and they ignited a heated debate in both law enforcement agencies and in their respective communities.
The study claimed that in Minneapolis, minorities were stopped more often than whites, while in St. Paul more whites were stopped, though minorities were twice as likely to be searched. The study, however, remains incomplete, as the racial make-up of the neighborhoods in which the data was collected was not taken into account. The results, though, are that this study spurred accusations of racial profiling against both departments.
It is important to understand that police objectives must also be analyzed when addressing racial profiling. Law enforcement officials are faced with the double burden of having to reduce crime by targeting problem areas or "crime hot spots," and maintaining good relationships with their respective communities. One result is that some community members claim police aren't doing enough, while others claim the police are targeting them. However, if the police have to target areas with high levels of crime and the majority of people living in and around that area are minorities, it often seems that the police can't win. Police must use different strategies for different areas of the community depending on the area's previous criminal records, on complaints and from observation; they must avoid indignifying people by using race as a factor suggesting potential guilt.
While the goals of the police must factor into how the racial profiling issue is viewed, there have been many national cases documenting explicit and intentional instances of racial profiling in an attempt to win the war on drugs. This practice is despicable and is humiliating for all the innocent people stopped and hassled. It is easy for those who haven't experienced racial profiling to dismiss it, however it is important to remember that the police must have valid reasons for questioning people. Responding to the study's findings, Minneapolis Police Chief Robert Olson is now requiring all reasons for stops and all searches to be recorded as of Feb. 1. While certainly an appropriate response, this type of record keeping should have been institutionalized a long time ago.
Regardless of the frequency of racial profiling, its occurrence does insult and demean people. Community relations are an important component of police responsibility, though it suffers if people in the community feel targeted by the police because of their age, race, sex or ethnicity. While the study is incomplete, it was beneficial in that it made local police aware that they are being watched and scrutinized.
|
