Welcome to RantCrush Top 5, where we take you through today’s top five controversial stories in the world of law and policy. Who’s ranting and raving right now? Check it out below:

Steve King Wants to Fund Border Wall With Food Stamps and Planned Parenthood Funding

The debate over how to fund a border wall between Mexico and the U.S. is far from over. The Office of Management and Budget has requested $1.6 billion in taxpayer money to pay for construction of the wall. But this morning, Representative Steve King from Iowa said he wants to spend even more money than that. In an interview on CNN, he said he would “throw another $5 billion on the pile and I would find half a billion of that from right out of Planned Parenthood’s budget. And the rest of it could come out of food stamps and the entitlements that are being spread out for people who haven’t worked in three generations.”

Has republican congressman @SteveKingIA – a friend of far-right populists Marine Le Pen and Geert Wilders – reached peak evil here? https://t.co/UuWWCdLr3C

— Evan O’Connell (@evanoconnell) July 12, 2017

Almost two-thirds of all Americans who receive food stamps are children, disabled, or elderly. An average food stamp household has an annual income of less than $10,000. “I’m sure that all of them didn’t need it,” King said.

In a document from May, the Trump Administration stated it wanted to cut the food stamp program by $193 billion. The irony is that out of the 10 areas with the highest concentration of food stamps, seven voted for Trump. This morning, King also implied that an increasing number of Americans are obese, so they don’t need food stamps.

Um. I think I just got to my desk in time to hear Rep. Steve King say on CNN getting rid of food stamps would solve obesity problem.

— Dorey Scheimer (@DoreyScheimer) July 12, 2017

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post RantCrush Top 5: July 12, 2017 appeared first on Law Street.

During the campaign, President-elect Donald Trump gave a speech in the wake of two bombings in New York and New Jersey. In response, Trump said that the police force should have the ability to profile suspects in order to be able to target individuals and subsequently catch criminals faster. While people quickly debated what exactly Trump was calling for, whether it was racial profiling versus criminal profiling, his comments immediately stirred debate over the questionable practice.

Read on to find out more about the history of racial profiling, how it is still used, its effectiveness, and the impact it has on individual freedom.

History of Racial Profiling

According to the ACLU, racial profiling is “the discriminatory practice by law enforcement officials of targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual’s race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin.” Racial profiling is closely associated with and only narrowly differentiated from criminal profiling which “is the reliance on a group of characteristics they believe to be associated with crime.”

In criminal profiling, the cumulative characteristics of people who have committed a crime are used to identify those who may be likely to commit the same crime. However, racial profiling assumes any member of a racial or ethnic group of people may commit a crime because of who they are.

In addition, part of racial profiling is willfully overlooking members of the majority when they commit crimes. The ACLU cites the following example:

An African American man in Maryland, who after moving into a white community, was attacked and subjected to property damage. Local police failed to respond to his repeated complaints until they arrested him for shooting his gun into the air, trying to disperse a hostile mob outside his home.

The accompanying video looks at the practice of racial profiling and what it means:

Racial profiling in the United States traces its roots all the way back to colonial times. One of the earliest examples was a registry in which free blacks were required to enlist. The registry kept track of a number of physical characteristics as well as how that person came to be free. The idea behind it was to limit the movement of free black people around the South. If they were unable to prove their status they could even be forced into slavery. This kind of targeting particularly reemerged during the Jim Crow era and continued on throughout the Civil Rights Movement and into the present. Often when it comes to racial profiling, the discriminatory practices are not written down in a record but implied.

The closely associated criminal profiling also has a long history, dating back to the 1880s in England when experts tried to track down the elusive Jack the Ripper. Profiling in the United States began gaining momentum in the late 1950s with profiles contributing to the arrest of suspects in high-profile crimes. In 1974 the FBI launched its Behavioral Science Unit utilizing profiling techniques to locate serial rapists and murders. Over the years psychology has taken a major role in these profiles as certain, common traits are identified in many of the cases and used to pinpoint other offenders. While this approach is used more to identify specific individuals guilty of specific crimes, it also creates a template for future investigations to use as well, which is similar to how the ACLU describes criminal profiling. Nevertheless, these same profiles cannot be overly broad generalizations, or they risk being another form of racial profiling.

The Use of Profiling

In his speech, one of the points Donald Trump alluded to was Israel’s use of racial profiling and the success it has had with it. While many other Western nations have shunned the practice, Israel has readily adopted it as a means of protection. This is especially true in airports where people with Jewish last names or links to Israel are able to quickly move through security while those from other regions, particularly from predominantly Muslim regions, are often held up for hours for intense inspections.

While the United States does not have similar programs, for the most part, there is one glaring exception that generated a lot of high profile coverage just a few years ago. That is the infamous stop-and-frisk program that was a major component of the New York Police Department’s effort to fight crime. While the city claimed this program was an effective way to reduce crime, a federal judge disagreed, claiming instead that it provided cover for officers to target non-white citizens in unnecessary and illegal ways.

While police officers are well within their right to stop someone they suspect of committing a crime or are likely to commit a crime, they must be able to demonstrate some cause. However, in the case of stop-and-frisk, people of color were being stopped at a disproportionately high rate, which led a federal judge to deem the policy unconstitutional. In fact, 83 percent of the stops conducted by the NYPD between 2004 and 2012 were of black or Hispanic people, while those groups made up slightly more than half of the city’s population. The following video gives the details behind the stop-and-frisk ruling in New York:

Although stop-and-frisk was really the only major program that led to clear racial profiling in an attempt to fight crime, as mentioned earlier, racial profiling is often done without a directive or anything on the books. The ACLU, for example, has a long list of what it claims are incidents of racial profiling against a variety of minority groups. Over the last couple of years, there have been a number of high-profile incidents involving white police officers and non-white victims, which certainly seem to indicate racial profiling does still occur even without an explicit policy.

When it comes to criminal profiling, the practice has gotten a lot of attention in popular culture but its effectiveness has also been called into question. Part of the problem is that criminal profiling is not much more reliable than racial profiling. According to a small study done in Britain, only 2.7 percent of 184 cases showed that the practice helped lead to an arrest. The main issue was there were so many different characteristics that it was hard to create a single profile that would be used to capture criminals. This sentiment was echoed by a Secret Service report on school shooters that suggested that potential shooters would have to be identified on an individual basis because they were all so different. The most common results, unfortunately, were confirmation bias at best, and at worst simply another form of prejudicial profiling.

Evaluating the Use of Profiling

Since racial profiling only targets a select group of people it is unsurprisingly not very effective. For the clearest evidence, one need only to look at New York’s stop-and-frisk program once more. Of all the people stopped, nearly 90 percent were released with no further action and were free to go. In other words, only 6 percent of stops ended with an arrest and another 6 percent resulted in court summonses. In fact, the data indicates that stop-and-frisk likely had little relation to the number of murders and other violent crimes in New York.

Other instances, such as the ones listed by the ACLU, also show how racial profiling is typically not effective. In fact, these instances of racial profiling only seem to make matters of crime worse as they encourage disaffected people to lash out in anger.

Impact

Not only is racial profiling ineffective it can also be harmful in the long run. The reason for this is because people who are unfairly targeted by police tend to feel a reduced trust in the police force as an effective means of fighting crime. When people do not trust the police, then the police are less able to do their jobs because they lack both authority and the necessary assistance from communities to help them with their work.

This feeling of being excessively targeted also seems to be supported by the numbers. The clearest example, and by now one that is well-worn, is the existence of clear racial discrepancies in prisons. Black male children born in 2001 are approximately 5.5 times more likely than white children to be incarcerated at some point in their life.

From a dollars and cents perspective, racial profiling is also costly. Retraining officers following a racial profiling incident or paying a settlement for racial profiling can cost a city or police department millions, if not tens of millions of dollars. There are countless examples of this, one of the most egregious is in Arizona–where the actions of notoriously prejudiced Sheriff Joe Arpaio just cost his county $22 million in settlements with Latino community members.

Conclusion

Like other controversial techniques for preventing crime, racial profiling does have its defenders. They argue that it has been successful in reducing crime and point to examples like stop-and-frisk in New York and to other countries that embrace the measure such as Israel. It even has a closely related cousin, criminal profiling, which relies on somewhat related methods to help in the hunt for criminals.

However, like many of those very same controversial techniques, the numbers suggest racial profiling actually does not really reduce crime at all. In fact, it may actually increase crime by lowering trust in police and diminishing officers’ effectiveness in minority communities. It also seems to fill prisons in the United States disproportionately by race while also costing police department millions in settlements and training.

Racial profiling then seems to be a practice that is more harmful than good. However, the reality of that may not outweigh some people’s perception that it is effective. In either case, the practice is unlikely to be done away with entirely, in the meantime it is likely to make the tenuous relationship between the police and many communities even worse.

Resources

CNN: Donald Trump Defends Racial Profiling in Wake of Bombings

ACLU: Racial Profiling: Definition

History News Network: The Roots of Racial Profiling

Haaretz: in Israel, Racial Profiling Doesn’t Warrant Debate or Apologies

The New York Times: Racial Discrimination in Stop-and-Frisk

American Psychological Association: Criminal Profiling: The Reality Behind the Myth

Center for Science and Law: Criminal Profiling, Present, and Future

National Institute of Justice: Race, Trust, and Police Legitimacy

Economic Policy Institute: Where Do We Go from Here? Mass Incarceration and the Struggle for Civil Rights

CNN: Racial profiling Costs Arizona County $22 million

Brennan Center for Justice: Ending New York’s Stop-and-Frisk Did Not Increase Crime

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Judging a Book by its Cover: The History of Racial Profiling in the United States appeared first on Law Street.

Is controversial Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio’s time in office almost up? On Tuesday, news broke that the federal government will file criminal contempt-of-court charges against Arpaio for ignoring orders from a judge. Arpaio was ordered to stop his anti-immigration policies in Arizona, but didn’t comply.

Two days later, activists from a movement called Bazta Arpaio stood outside of the Phoenix sheriff’s office holding a balloon modeled to look like Arpaio in handcuffs. Their organizer Del Palacio said: “The community is excited. They know that this is the best chance we have to get him out of office. Momentum is on our side.”

Today Joe Arpaio goes to court for violating a judges order. Who the criminal now, Joe? #bAZtaArpaio #NoMoreHate @CASEActionAZ pic.twitter.com/mDpT6Tiln2

— Hugo Soto (@HugoSotoLA) October 11, 2016

The group is urging Hispanic people to vote against Arpaio, both to kick him out of office and also with the hopes that it will increase voter participation. The sheriff is seeking a seventh term, and has also been campaigning for Donald Trump, so the new criminal charges came at a pretty bad time for him.

Members of the Bazta Arpaio group said that he has abused their community for a long time and it is time to get him out of office. They will focus on door knocking and campaigning in Latino neighborhoods and will also drive around a red bus spreading their message.

Berta, an organizer w #baztaarpaio and one of Arpaio’s victims, encourages voters to kick him out of office nov. 8 pic.twitter.com/VFzKX14nxN

— Tania A. Unzueta (@_LaTania) October 13, 2016

The court process has been going on since 2008, when some civil rights groups filed a lawsuit regarding racial profiling in the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office. This led to findings of a pattern of racial bias and in 2013 Arpaio was told to stop his immigration-enforcement operations. These included racial profiling of Hispanic people at traffic stops, patrols in predominantly Latino neighborhoods, and detaining people solely based on their perceived immigration status.

In May of this year the judge in the case, U.S. District Judge G. Murray Snow, found Arpaio was guilty of civil contempt of court for ignoring his orders. The official charges were announced on Tuesday. Arpaio has said he didn’t defy the orders on purpose. But if found guilty, the 84-year-old self-proclaimed “toughest sheriff in America” could face six months in jail.

In his statement on the case, Arpaio blamed Obama for being corrupt and the DOJ of charging him for political reasons.

Here is Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s two-part statement about the corrupt DOJ charging him for enforcing our immigration laws. It’s a MUST read. pic.twitter.com/7LhZQXectZ

— Jeremy Nolt (@RealJeremyNolt) October 11, 2016

According to experts, this is more of a symbolic move from the judge. “He’s really taking a stance that ‘Sheriff Joe’ is not above the law. That anyone can be held accountable for their behavior–even if you’re a very popular sheriff,” said criminal justice professor Cara Rabe-Hemp.

Arpaio is an outspoken Trump supporter who joined the fight to find out the “truth” about Obama’s birth certificate. He has also become known for forcing inmates to wear pink underwear and sleep outside. No matter how the election in November goes, Del Palacio and other activists have their minds set on not letting him get re-elected as sheriff. “Regardless of what happens in the trial, we’re going to remain focused to ensure that his tenure ends on November 8” he said.

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Will Arizona Voters Come Together to Remove “America’s Toughest Sheriff”? appeared first on Law Street.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) filed a complaint on Wednesday against Southwest Airlines for kicking a Muslim man off his flight back in April for talking in Arabic, his native language. In the complaint to the Department of Transportation, CAIR calls for a federal investigation into the incident for what it believes was racial and religious profiling.

On April 6, 26-year-old political science student Khairuldeen Makhzoomi was sitting on the plane, talking on the phone with his uncle about a dinner with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon the night before. He realized a woman was staring at him when he hung up the phone, and thought maybe he had been talking too loud. He had told his uncle about the meeting and ended the conversation by the common phrase “insha’Allah,” meaning “God willing.” The woman left the plane abruptly, and a few minutes later police officers came up to Makhzoomi.

Did you know Americans are not allowed to know Arabic? A new rule apparently created by airlines. https://t.co/gxUanGbats

— Heidi N Moore (@moorehn) October 6, 2016

According to Southwest Airlines, the company does “not tolerate discrimination” but thought this was a legitimate reason to investigate a passenger. They wrote in a statement:

The internal review determined that it was the content of the conversation, not the language used, that prompted the report leading to the investigation. Our crew responded by following protocol, as required by federal law, to investigate any potential threat.

It is interesting that it was the content of the conversation that started an investigation, considering the only person who heard it was the woman who alerted the airline staff and the conversation was in Arabic. Southwest still has not apologized to Makhzoomi even though subsequent questioning by the FBI didn’t come up with anything. He felt humiliated and had problems sleeping for days after the incident. He told CNN:

The guy who came and pulled me from the plane, he took me to the jet bridge, I believe he worked with Southwest and I must say he was aggressive in the way he treated me. He was not very nice. He tried to speak to me in Arabic, but I couldn’t understand his Arabic, so I asked him to speak to me in English. I felt oppressed. I was afraid. He said, ‘You seem that you were having a serious conversation on the phone. Who were you talking to?’

“Inshallah” = we hope in English, gets this guy thrown off @SouthwestAir flight. #Inshallah they get sued. https://t.co/Z4SIp2zirj

— Joyce Karam (@Joyce_Karam) October 6, 2016

After Makhzoomi told the man he was talking to his uncle about having dinner with the U.N. Secretary-General, he showed him a video of it on his phone. But the man asked, “Why are you talking in Arabic? You know the environment is very dangerous.”

Following that, agents searched Makhzoomi, dogs sniffed his luggage, and his wallet was taken away. He was not allowed back on the plane and did not receive an apology. One agent even told him, “You need to be very honest with us with what you said about the martyrs. Tell us everything you know about the martyrs.” He said he had never mentioned anything about any martyrs but said “God willing” when saying goodbye to his uncle.

Khairuldeen Makhzoomi came to the United States as a legal immigrant with his sister in 2010. He is a student at University of California, Berkeley, and is about to apply for his master’s degree. He pointed out that he is very grateful for what the United States has provided him. But the incident in April shook him. He also said, “The U.S. is the land of freedom. People respect the rule of law. How could people be humiliated like this? That was the real shock. I lived under Saddam Hussein. I know what discrimination feels like.”

Emma Von Zeipel

Emma Von Zeipel is a staff writer at Law Street Media. She is originally from one of the islands of Stockholm, Sweden. After working for Democratic Voice of Burma in Thailand, she ended up in New York City. She has a BA in journalism from Stockholm University and is passionate about human rights, good books, horses, and European chocolate. Contact Emma at EVonZeipel@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Complaint Filed Against Southwest for Incident with Arabic-Speaking Student appeared first on Law Street.

There’s a new police chief in Ferguson, Missouri and his name is Andre Anderson. Ferguson leaders have introduced him as the city’s first African-American head of the police, because they believe he’s the right man for the very tough job.

Anderson is taking a six month leave from his Glendale, Arizona commander post to take on the new role of the city’s interim police chief. If all goes well, this is a role that could potentially become permanent by the end of his service.

Anderson told reporters his first priority would be “simply to build trust” and enhance the city’s recent efforts to get officers to develop positive relationships with people in the areas they patrol. Anderson explained this is not something the force can do on its own. He said to the residents “we cannot do this without you. I believe together, we can forge better relationships.” In addition, Anderson also plans to train his officers to guard against bias and escalation, and focus on hiring more qualified Black officers.

While the effort for a change within this department is appreciated, this does not mean the problem has been solved. Change will not come with just a new temporary police chief who is Black and has plans to hire more Black cops and work with the community. Yes, these are all steps in the right direction, but change will not come until our society, which includes police officers, respect Black lives.

After the August 9 shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown, an unarmed Black teenager who died at the hands of a white Ferguson police officer, the Ferguson Police Department was suddenly under the microscope. Brown’s killing sparked a revolution in Ferguson, creating weeks of fiery protests and threw a national spotlight on the St. Louis suburb of 21,000. The protests only increased when Wilson was not indicted by a grand jury.

Darren Wilson made comments describing what he did as the “right thing to do,” because he wasn’t quite sure what Brown could be capable of. He claimed that during their scuffle, Brown was abrasive, and tried to lunge at him more than once. He also claimed that Brown told Wilson he was “too much of a p– to shoot him.” But many people question the accuracy of his story, as well as Wilson’s reasoning. Even though he claimed the outcome would have been the exact same had Brown been white, this is something many are uncertain of, as Brown was also unarmed. The controversy has continued, as the department  saw many resignations after the release of a report from the Justice Department that found a culture of racism in the police department and municipal offices. Former Police Chief Tom Jackson was among the city officials who resigned.

A large issue between police officers and minority communities is that community members fear or do not respect white police officers. If there are more Black police officers in the community, this relationship could change, but it’s not enough. This is a great step in the right direction, but that does not mean the problematic culture doesn’t still exist. There’s still a long way to go to ensure that everyone is treated fairly by the law.

Angel Idowu

Angel Idowu is a member of the Beloit College Class of 2016 and was a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Angel at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Ferguson’s New Interim Police Chief: Step in the Right Direction, But Still Not Enough appeared first on Law Street.

Mayor of London Boris Johnson just announced that by the end of March 2016, the majority of Metropolitan Police officers will be supplied with 20,000 body cameras in an effort to help officers gather evidence to fight crime and boost public confidence. Metropolitan Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe said, “For too long our equipment has lagged behind the technology almost everyone has in their pockets to capture events as they unfold.” But while this now-international trend toward implementing body cams can help to uphold the law in theory, there are still concerns about whether this technology can really do its job in practice.

Mayor Boris Johnson confirms plans to roll out 20,000 police body cameras across the Met: https://t.co/JTlW1tKUpj pic.twitter.com/2W32Hznv4K

— MOPAC (@MOPACLdn) June 3, 2015

This development will make London the most body camera heavy city in the world, further advancing Britain’s status as one of the most surveilled states. The British Security Industry Authority (BSIA) estimates that there are up to 5.9 million closed-circuit television cameras in the country, or one camera for every eleven people in the United Kingdom.

For the past year, police officers in London have undergone trials of the body cameras and have reported positive results. The trial has allowed officers to generate about 6,000 video clips per month, which are uploaded daily and referenced when the footage is considered necessary for evidence. These trials, set to end later this summer, suggest that the implementation of body cameras can increase the number of guilty pleas and reduce complaints, speeding up the justice system. London police have come under scrutiny for controversial stop-and-search laws, which disproportionately target minority groups. London officials hope that body cameras will help to improve public trust and increase officer accountability in these scenarios.

While body cameras may be useful for monitoring daily operations of police officers, some civil rights groups are concerned that the technology will prove to be an intrusive surveillance tool that can be easily exploited. There is also concern about who has access to the footage and if it will be publicly accessible. The Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime has plans to lead a citywide public engagement training to explain how the cameras work and when Londoners might encounter them. The London Policing Ethics Panel intends to produce the United Kingdom’s first report regarding the ethics of officers’ use of the cameras, which will be published in the fall.

Cities across the United States are also providing their officers with cameras. The company Taser, a maker of body cams, reported a 50 percent increase in sales in the first three months of 2015. While continued proliferation of body cameras seems forthcoming, critiques of the cameras’ use are also widespread. Most footage caught on camera is not considered public record, which has proved problematic–police departments can easily erase destructive footage. In some cases, officers forget to turn on their body or dashboard cameras, since neither device is constantly recording, but needs to be manually switched on. Some police officers’ cameras have conveniently malfunctioned at the time of an encounter, leaving victims of police brutality without evidence of their claims. Had the Ferguson, Missouri police department mandated the use of police officer body cameras or used dashboard cameras in patrol cars, the mystery surrounding what truly happened leading up to and during the fatal Michael Brown shooting of 2014 would have been absolved.

Necessary changes must be made to officer accountability in the wake of years of unrest. London is taking a huge step forward in what may become a revolution in police liability and encouraging a positive shift in public discourse about law enforcement. Video clips should be accessible by the public. Police officers should be held individually accountable for the use of their cameras, by disciplining those who routinely forget to turn on their body cams. Police departments, prosecutors, and every other chain of command throughout the justice system should work toward preserving footage to protect the rights of the abused, even if—and especially when—police officers are in the wrong. While implementation of body cameras is the first move going forward–and London should be applauded for its efforts–effective, ethical execution of their use is the most important step.

Emily Dalgo

Emily Dalgo is a member of the American University Class of 2017 and a Law Street Media Fellow during the Summer of 2015. Contact Emily at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post London Moves Forward with Police Body Cams: Will the U.S. Follow? appeared first on Law Street.

We know their names by heart because they’ve become the public faces of a national epidemic. Oscar Grant, Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and Tamir Rice–five names that represent the unjust murder of unarmed black males. But there are many more names on that list, including 53-year-old father of four Walter L. Scott. Scott was shot and killed Saturday by an white South Carolinian police officer while attempting to run away. A graphic of the video of the shooting has surfaced, leading to public outrage and resulting in the officer who shot him being charged with murder.

Be advised that the video below contains both graphic images and language.

According to the New York Times, the officer, Michael T. Slager, 33, attempted to justify the shooting, saying he feared for his life because Scott had taken his stun gun in a scuffle after Slager had stopped him in a Mercedes-Benz for a broken taillight. In the video, however, Scott is seen running away when Slager fires seemingly eight times at his back before finally collapsing.

At a news conference Tuesday, authorities announced that after viewing the video footage, they had decided to charge the officer with murder. North Charleston Mayor Keith Summey said during the news conference.

When you’re wrong, you’re wrong. And if you make a bad decision, don’t care if you’re behind the shield or just a citizen on the street, you have to live by that decision.

Police reports indicate that Officer Slager reported on his radio, “shots fired and the subject is down; He took my Taser” moments after the shooting. But the taser defense story could potentially be a sham. During the initial scuffle at the beginning of the video something looks to have been either tossed or knocked to the ground behind the two men. After the shooting, the officer then runs back toward where the initial scuffle occurred and picks something up off the ground and then appears to drop an object near Scott’s body moments later. Unfortunately it’s tough to determine the full story because the images are shaky and unclear. Many are now speculating that this object was the officer’s taser, which he was potentially planting in order to corroborate his story, but that has yet to be proven by investigators.

The bystander who filmed the video has not yet been identified, but is being hailed as a hero by Scott’s family for providing the footage to them, which they then turned over to the New York Times. In the video below, Walter Scott’s brother and family attorney Chris Stewart react to the shooting, with Stewart making the bold statement “running from an officer doesn’t result in the death penalty.”

Stewart has a vital point that running away should not be a death sentence, but Supreme Court case law may beg to differ. In Tennessee v. Garner the court declared that officers may use deadly force against a fleeing suspect if there’s probable cause that the suspect “poses a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or others.” Officer Slager may try to use this precedent in his criminal defense or in the civil suit against him that Scott’s family has declared that they intend to file.

This avoidable incident has only helped fuel public distrust for law enforcement as well as raise questions that there may be serious discriminatory problems ingrained in our police forces, as proved evident in Ferguson. One thing however is certain–Walter Scott’s story, while unfortunately not unique, does matter.

Alexis Evans

Alexis Evans is an Assistant Editor at Law Street and a Buckeye State native. She has a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and a minor in Business from Ohio University. Contact Alexis at aevans@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post South Carolina Cop Charged With the Murder of Walter Scott appeared first on Law Street.

After spending the last three months reviewing 35,000 pages of Ferguson police records and other documents, Department of Justice investigators have found that despite the fact that African Americans make up just over 65 percent of the population in Ferguson, they accounted for 93 percent of all arrests between 2012 and 2014. Their findings confirm the public opinion theory that the department responsible for the death of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown is plagued with racial bias. The DOJ found that the Ferguson Police Department routinely violated the constitutional rights of black people in the form of racial profiling, excessive force, and unsubstantiated arrests.

I invite you to read the full 102 page report courtesy of Vox here, but for the sake of time here are the more shocking stats regarding Ferguson police practices found in the report:

• 93 percent of the people arrested were black
• 90 percent of citations were given to black people
• 88 percent of cases where police reported using force were against black people
• 85 percent of vehicle stops involved black people
• 94 percent of Failure to Comply charges were given to black people
• 100 percent of police canine biting incidents for which racial information is available, the person bitten was black.

It gets worse. The report also included references to several racist emails by Ferguson officials, all of whom are current employees, sent through their official City of Ferguson email accounts during work hours on the taxpayers’ dime. Here are a few of DOJ officials’ descriptions of the outrageously offensive emails in the report:

A November 2008 email stated that President Barack Obama would not be President for very long because ‘what black man holds a steady job for four years.’

A May 2011 email stated: ‘An African-American woman in New Orleans was admitted into the hospital for a pregnancy termination. Two weeks later she received a check for $5,000. She phoned the hospital to ask who it was from. The hospital said, ‘Crimestoppers.’’

A June 2011 email described a man seeking to obtain ‘welfare’ for his dogs because they are ‘mixed in color, unemployed, lazy, can’t speak English and have no frigging clue who their Daddies are.’

An October 2011 email included a photo of a bare-chested group of dancing women, apparently in Africa, with the caption, ‘Michelle Obama’s High School Reunion.’

According to CNN, the DOJ formally ended its investigation into Officer Darren Wilson in the fatal shooting of Brown by choosing not to bring forth criminal charges, determining in another report that:

There is no evidence upon which prosecutors can rely to disprove Wilson’s stated subjective belief that he feared for his safety.

However, the investigative findings may provide little closure for a city still full of civil unrest, but very much in need of healing. Protest leaders are calling for the resignation of Ferguson Police Chief Tom Jackson and the disbandment of the entire department. Jackson’s resignation may in fact be inevitable, this report serving as a proverbial final nail in the coffin for him and his entire police force.

Alexis Evans

Alexis Evans is an Assistant Editor at Law Street and a Buckeye State native. She has a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and a minor in Business from Ohio University. Contact Alexis at aevans@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post DOJ Finds Racial Bias in the Ferguson Police Department appeared first on Law Street.

On Monday, luxury department store Barneys New York made a $525,000 settlement in response to a racial profiling investigation by the State of New York. Nineteen-year-old Queens resident Trayon Christian used his savings to purchase a Salvatore Ferragamo belt at the Fifth Avenue store in Manhattan, only to be arrested shortly after leaving. The clerk who sold him the $350 belt had allegedly called the police claiming fraud. Apparently, the company has racial profiling ingrained into its employee policy. Security guards are told to watch minority customers in the store more closely than their white customers, and clerks are to prevent making sales to minority customers in order to avoid fraud investigations. The investigation also found that Barneys must have been collaborating with the NYPD by placing undercover detectives in their store.

These days, you can’t seem to look at the news without hearing about another unarmed black kid who was “accidentally” shot by police. Racial profiling is a not only a violation of human rights, but can also result in serious consequences for the innocent minority victim.

The police told Christian that his debit card must be a fake because a black man could never afford such an expensive item. He was then held at the police station for two hours until they realized that he was innocent. Christian, who is a student at the NYC College of Technology, had saved up to buy the belt because he wanted one like the Harlem rapper Juelz Santana. Lower class consumers are just as entitled as upper class ones to use their own money to buy a designer item, right? Isn’t such a notion the mere foundation of capitalism?

A belt similar to the one Trayon Christian purchased in April 2013. Thanks NY Post.

In luxury retail stores, customers are rarely asked for identification with their credit card because it is considered rude. Part of the luxury customer experience involves being treated well, because they are spending so much money. Also, the more accommodating a salesperson is to a customer, the more money the customer may spend in the store. The main purpose of a retail store is to put the customer’s needs first, as they are “always right.”

On the other hand, stores must also protect themselves with lost prevention (LP) policies. There are plenty of telltale signs that a person may be shoplifting, but being black or Latino is not one of them. Also if a customer is suspected of shoplifting, the salesperson is expected to provide even more service to deter them from stealing, as they are still technically considered a customer if they are in the store.

When I worked as a sales associate in a luxury mall, I went through intensive LP training, but race was never mentioned as any reason to be suspicious of customers. However, we were also constantly reminded that we were to be extra accommodating to customers as they were accustomed to a different level of service than in other malls. Wealthy customers were actually more inclined to try to get away with a quick buck than average ones. They almost expected us to make exceptions for them when it came to expired coupons or discounts they seemed to make up on their own. Shouldn’t that kind of behavior be seen as a bigger red flag when it comes to credit fraud?

Barneys’ claim that they are avoiding fraud investigations is completely invalid, as there are many other ways to prevent shoplifters. Perhaps they would save even more money if they taught their employees real lost prevention techniques, instead of taking shortcuts by racially profiling customers and outsourcing to the NYPD. A minority customer’s business should be just as valued as a white customer’s would be. Ultimately, the company lost even more money because they had to pay for a settlement. Christian also returned the belt shortly after his arrest because he no longer wanted to have anything to do with the company.

The battle is only halfway done, however, as there is a federal case that has yet to go to trial. Hopefully, the trial will result in further regulations in what stores can and cannot do as far as customer service and lost prevention policies. All customers, provided they are not trying to take advantage of the company, should be treated as equal opportunities to make a profit for both the salesperson and the company represented.

At the end of the day, a retail store must focus on making revenue and ensuring that customers will want to return for their services. Turning away a customer because of the color of their skin is ultimately bad business for everyone. Besides, as in Barneys’ case, what’s $350 in potential theft compared to over $500,000 in legal fines? That choice is ultimately up to the retailer.

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Katherine Fabian (@kafernn) is a recent graduate of Fordham University’s College at Lincoln Center and is currently applying to law schools, freelance writing, and teaching yoga. She hopes to one day practice fashion law and defend the intellectual property rights of designers.

Featured image courtesy of [Jim.Henderson via WikiMedia Commons]

Katherine Fabian

Katherine Fabian is a recent graduate of Fordham University’s College at Lincoln Center. She is a freelance writer and yoga teacher who hopes to one day practice fashion law and defend the intellectual property rights of designers. Contact Katherine at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Barneys Gets Busted: The Cost of Racial Profiling in Retail appeared first on Law Street.

I want to begin by saying that the law is not perfect. It can’t be. It is created by human beings, written by human beings, interpreted by human beings, and ultimately enforced by human beings. It’s important to begin with this premise because, I think, it helps one understand that the law allows for mistakes. It allows police officers to get it wrong sometimes. But that is no balm to the individuals whose fundamental human dignity is diminished due to racial profiling.

This post comes on the heels of news out of Rochester, New York. Three young, African American male students were standing on the sidewalk waiting. They ended up being arrested by the police after they were “told to disperse.” The police report claimed that the boys were blocking pedestrian traffic and preventing free passage of citizens walking by and attempting to enter a nearby store. Well, loitering in many places is illegal. Could these young men have been waiting to assault someone? Were they members of some young gang of hoodlums?

Actually, they were just three young boys waiting at a designated location for a school bus to pick them up and take them to a basketball scrimmage. Their adult coach arrived just as the boys were being handcuffed, and he was also threatened with arrest. Members of the Rochester school board have spoken out and are calling for charges to be dropped immediately.

It seems we can add “standing on the sidewalk and waiting for someone or something” to the list of things young Black males just can’t do. Already on that list was walking home from a store at night wearing a hoodie, and walking either too fast or too slow through either a really nice neighborhood or a “high crime” neighborhood. What this case boils down to is racial profiling. The essence of the phenomenon is police suspecting or actually creating illegal activity based on perfectly legal actions that just-so-happened to be performed by minorities. “Driving while Black” is a familiar form.

According to the Racial Profiling Data Collection Resource Center at Northeastern University, more than twenty states have passed legislation banning or requiring the jurisdiction to collect data on law enforcement stops or searches. But racial profiling comes in many forms. It may just come in the form of an officer questioning more young Latino men on the street than young White men in Los Angeles. It might come in the form of an officer who is inclined to pull over a young, Black male driving a nice car in a not-so-nice neighborhood. If these stops never lead to formal arrest or formal prosecution, they often never get even local, let alone national, attention. But those acts are no less profiling and no less abusive to the individuals stopped.

In the experience of many minorities, it goes without saying that law enforcement respond and act differently in assessing the suspicion of a person of color. Many news stories and examples illustrate this point.

This video for example:

Or this video:

The second video is telling in just how disparate the reactions of the general population are when the same acts are committed by individuals of different races. The young White boy is questioned far less often than the Black boy. In fact, people seem to deputize themselves and feel a sense of urgency to thwart crime when they see the Black person attempting to remove the bike. Indeed, it seems that if you are a White female, most people might actually assist you in whatever activity you seem to be doing. I guess next time I need to move or paint my apartment I’ll disguise myself as a White woman.

This implicit racial bias exists in the subconscious of us all. The idea that it wouldn’t also manifest itself in the decisions of law enforcement is laughable. However, what always astonishes me is when the calm, logical, legal explanations are utterly ignored by law enforcement seemingly so bent on finding crime where none exists.This is bound to foster a feeling of inherent criminality in many poorer, minority communities that is demeaning to one’s spirit and degrading to one’s dignity.

In the future, I know not to stand on the sidewalk too long lest I be arrested.

There go my plans for a lemonade stand this summer.

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Featured image courtesy of [longislandwins via Flickr]

Dominic Jones

Dominic Jones is originally from Atlantic City, NJ. He attended Morehouse College in Atlanta, Ga. followed by law school at the Washington College of Law at American University in Washington, DC. In his spare time he enjoys art, photography, and documentary films. Contact Dominic at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Profiling appeared first on Law Street.

Stop-and-frisk policies were one of the hottest topics in law enforcement in the last several years. The controversial New York policy made headlines, led to accusations of racial profiling and discrimination, and was the subject of multiple court cases. Now, the practice has basically been discontinued altogether. Read on to learn about stop-and-frisk policies, the arguments for and against them, and the progress we’ve made since.

What is Stop and Frisk?

Stop and Frisk is a situation in which a police officer detains a suspicious person and runs his hands lightly over the suspect’s outer garments in order to determine if that person is carrying a concealed weapon. If this “patting down” doesn’t alleviate the officer’s suspicion, he may also check the suspect’s pockets. Its constitutionality derives from the 1968 Supreme Court decision of Terry v. Ohio in which the Court ruled that it is constitutional under the Fourth Amendment; however, many criticize the stop-and-frisk practice for being a racial profiling tool, claiming that a disproportionate number of Blacks and Hispanics are subject to it.

On August 12, 2013, in Floyd v. City of New York, the Southern District Court of New York ruled that stop and frisk is unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment as well as the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The decision was met with a lot of criticism and the Second Circuit Court of Appeals initially blocked and randomly reassigned the case in October 2013, stating that Judge Scheindlin, who wrote the majority opinion in August, “ran afoul” and had “compromised the appearance of impartiality surrounding this litigation.” More recently, the Court of Appeals failed to find any misconduct or ethical violation by Scheindlin and declined to reverse the decision. But it continued the stay on the ruling until the City of New York appealed it.

Why was it ruled unconstitutional in August 2013?

Activists in New York have been fighting stop and frisk for years. The August 2013 decision was based on a wealth of statistical data. Out of 4.4 million stops over the span of eight-and-a-half years, 52 percent of suspects were Black, 31 percent were Hispanic, and 10 percent were White (from a population of 23 percent Black, 29 percent Hispanic, and 33 percent White). Furthermore, in 23 to 24 percent of all stops with Black or Hispanic suspects, the police used force. Contrastingly, the police used force in 17 percent of all stops with White suspects. It was this evidence that prompted Scheindlin to write, “the policy encourages the targeting of young black and Hispanic men based on their prevalence in local crime complaints. This is a form of racial profiling.” Unlike former Mayor Bloomberg who strongly supported the practice, Mayor Bill de Blasio sharply criticized the policy during his campaign and promised to reform it. The public was outraged when the City of New York appealed the August 2013 decision.

What was the argument in favor of stop and frisk?

Supporters of stop and frisk believe in its efficacy for driving down crime. One of the most vocal supporters of the practice said that rules against stop and frisk “will make it harder for our police officers to protect New Yorkers and continue to drive down crime.” He argued that a disproportionate number of Blacks and Hispanics are stopped under this practice because a disproportionate number of them commit crimes. At least 10 out of 19 stops have been deemed justified. A report stated that gun shootings have increased by 2.3 percent between August and November 2013. The efficacy of this practice is further supported by a study that revealed that more than half of stops lead to guilty convictions, therefore keeping criminals off the street.

What’s the status of stop and frisk now?

Stop and frisk has pretty much been eliminated. According to data obtained by the New Republic, stop-and-frisk incidents have fallen by almost 80 percent during the first three quarters of 2014. More importantly, the seemingly apocalyptic scenario that many warned about if stop and frisk was discontinued didn’t happen. In August 2013, right when stop and frisk was ruled unconstitutional, New York City Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said, “No question about it, violent crime will go up.” Bloomberg  agreed: “if you try to so much as reform stop and frisk…you’re playing politics with people’s lives.”

But crime hasn’t actually gone up–in fact, just the opposite. It’s decreased, the same way that it has been steadily decreasing over the last few decades nationwide. Despite no more stop and frisk, the streets of New York City are getting safer.

Stop and frisk does still happen, though it’s gone down a lot. There’s a Twitter account dedicated to memorializing all the times that stop-and-frisk incidents happen, @stopandfrisk. It’s still active, and it still chronicles incidences of stop and frisk being used on citizens.

Stop and frisk could have made some sense, in theory, but ended up being a more problematic program than it was worth, not to mention unconstitutional. It’s heartening to see that the crime rate has continued to fall, even with stop and frisk no longer being used.

Resources

Primary

US Constitution: Fourth Amendment

US Constitution: Fourteenth Amendment

NYPD: New York City Police Department Stop Question & Frisk Activity Official Report of First Quarter, 2013

New York Civil Liberties Union: Stop-And-Frisk Campaign

Center for Constitutional Rights: Floyd, et al. v. City of New York

Additional

Nation: Ending Stop-And-Frisk, Keeping the Racism

Washington Post: Judge Says New York’s ‘Stop-and-Frisk’ Law Unconstitutional

Al-Jazeera: New Yorkers Urge de Blasio to #DropTheAppeal on Stop-and-Frisk

MSNBC: African-American Teen Says Stop-and-Frisk Has Made Him Fear Police

ACLU: We Know That Stop-and-Frisk is All Kinds of Horrible: So Why is it Expanding Nationwide?

Wall Street Journal: Judge Rules NYPD Stop-and-Frisk Practice Violates Rights

USA Today: Trayvon Martin’s Mom Blasts ‘Stop-and-Frisk’

Huffington Post: Joe Lhota Says Only Some of Stop and Frisks Might Constitute Racial Profiling In NYC

Washington Post: Ray Kelley defends New York’s controversial ‘stop and frisk’ law

NY Daily News: Bloomberg Sues City Council to Overturn Law Targeting Stop-and-Frisk Profiling

Washington Times: New York Police, Banned From Stop-and-Frisk, Warn of 12 Percent Drop in Gun Seizures

Reuters: Half of New York’s Stop-and-Frisk Arrests Yield Convictions

Legal Dictionary: Stop-and-Frisk

The New York Times: Court Block’s Stop-and-Frisk Changes for New York Police

Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology: Reflections on New York’s Stop-and-Frisk law and it’s Claimed Unconstitutionality

Fordham Law Review: The Right to Investigate and New York’s “Stop and Frisk” Law

VOA News: After NYC Elections, ‘Stop-and-Frisk’ Debate Persists

Law Street Media Staff

Law Street Media Staff posts are written by the team at Fastcase and Law Street Media

The post Stop and Frisk: Did Ending it Make a Difference? appeared first on Law Street.

Two classic New York City department stores—Barneys and Macy’s—are dealing with controversy regarding their racial profiling of any customer who is not white. In the past few weeks, at least four different individuals have come forward claiming that they were mistreated and suspected of shoplifting or fraud on the basis of race.

The story begins with an African-American college student named Trayon Christian, who was a freshman at the New York City College of Technology last spring. On April 29^th, he went into the popular store Barneys New York to buy a belt. The belt that he was looking for was a Ferragamo and cost $329. Like any 18-year-old kid, he admired his favorite celebrities and had seen some of them with the belt. So, he saved up money from his part time job to buy it for himself. Christian paid with his debit card, showed his ID when asked, and followed all of the general procedures required to make a purchase. He walked out of the store with the belt in a bag and a receipt, and was stopped right away by cops who yelled at him about how he was able to afford a designer belt. Immediately, the 19-year-old was accused of using a fake card. Christian was handcuffed, and then detained and interrogated for two hours until it could be determined that his card was, in fact, valid.

The next person to come forward was Kayla Phillips, and like Christian she was a young African-American student. She was purchasing a designer Celine purse for $2500. She had received a large, unexpected tax refund a few days before, and decided to use the extra money to treat herself and purchase a designer bag. She had a strikingly similar experience to Christian. She was followed by no less than four undercover cops and questioned about her ability to afford the bag. Like in Christian’s case, the officers were convinced that she was perpetrating credit card fraud.

A few days after these two stories broke, allegations also came out against Macy’s department store. Rob Brown, 29, is an actor who is currently on HBO’s hit show Treme. According to a suit filed this week by Brown, he went into Macy’s to buy a $1350 watch as a present for his mother. He was looking at a pair of sunglasses that caught his eye when he suddenly grabbed by three officers. According to the suit, the officers told him that the ID “was false and that he could afford to make such an expensive purchase.” Despite the fact that Brown showed them various forms of ID that clearly matched the card he was using, he was still put in handcuffs and detained for 45 minutes.

These three cases are in various stages of moving forward and list both these retailers as well as the NYPD. Now, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has begun investigations into these complaints. The purpose is to determine if Barneys and Macy’s have violated various civil rights laws that prohibit racial discrimination. The AG has demanded that these stores release information about the stopping, detainment, and interrogations of various customers.

Barneys has released an apology, but these suits and investigation will rightly move forward. I would be entirely unsurprised if more claims come out against other companies in the coming days and weeks. It would be hard to imagine that Barneys and Macy’s profile in a way that is unique to those companies; it is much more probable that we’ll hear similar situations with Nordstrom, Saks Fifth Avenue, and others. It’s also hard to imagine that this is an issue unique to New York City, I would imagine such profiling happens around the country as well. This story that began with a teenage boy who just wanted to buy a new belt has the potential to turn into a major retail firestorm.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Steve Depolo via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post New York AG Investigating Racist Policies In Department Stores appeared first on Law Street.