Police Profiling
During the Civil Rights movement, thousands of blacks were arrested and beaten by police. Toady we face the same problem, police departments gets more and more complaints from black citizens. In New York City in 1999 a street merchant was mistakenly shot to death because a cops thought he pulled out a gun. In New Jersey four college basketball players were heading for tryouts at a college, when stopped the driver couldn't get the van into park the two officers opened fire. Luckily nobody was hurt. Racial Profiling is one of the most volatile civil rights issues in the U.S. and even the most successful African-Americans are not immune to it (Most 89). Recent research shows that crime is down, but it also shows that police target blacks more than whites. Racial subjects attract attention from Civil rights groups, Politics, and the locals. What do they know, were they there when the Cops shot the merchant or the college players? Minorities' say they're more worried about the cops than the crooks (Cannon&Morrow 35). Politics play the biggest roles take Rudy Giuliani for instance, mayor of New York City. He lashed out at those who criticized the cops calling the demonstrations silly, and saw his
Within two years of the policy's adoption, the number of felonies in the subway declined by more than 30%. Why? Well, one out of every six fare evaders stopped by the Transit Police in 1991 either was carrying a weapon or was wanted for another crime on an outstanding warrant. By paying attention to behavior that most people regard as not worth bothering about, the Transit Police prevented some violent crimes on the subways. A group of black state legislators, ministers and civil-rights advocates gathered to denounce Col. Williams as a racist. "His views are dastardly, he's unfit to hold such a critical, important office." Mr. Williams was dismissed hours later. {Jackson Toby, Wall Street Journal, March 11, 1999 } Should the New York City Police Department, have been convicted of racism and Mr. Williams have been fired as superintendent of the New Jersey State Police? In my opinion, I don't think so. Sure, the police should have used better judgment and Mr. Williams should have kept his ideas and thoughts to himself, but he was defending his officers against what he considered a bum rap: that they were racists. According to a survey sponsored by the New Jersey Office of the Public Defender, blacks accounted for 13% of drivers on the south end of the New Jersey Turnpike, 15% of speeders, and 35% of those stopped by the state police. Is this evidence of police racism? Not necessarily. True, most blacks and Hispanics are law-abiding. But if drug traffickers are disproportionately black or Hispanic, the police don't need to be racist to stop many minority motorists; they simply have to be efficient in targeting potential drug traffickers. It is an unfortunate fact that much higher proportions of black children than white grow up at a social disadvantage and are more tempted to break society's rules. Thus, although blacks are only 12% of the American population, in a recent year they comprised 56% of the arrests for murder, 42% of the arrests for rape, 61% of the arrests for robbery, 39% of the arrests for aggravated assault, 31% of the arrests for burglary, 33% of the arrests for larceny and 40% of the arrests for motor-vehicle theft. Also 46% of state prison inmates-i.e. those actually convicted of crimes -were black {another 17% were Hispanic}. Why should they not be equally overrepresented in drug trafficking, which is less easy to measure statistically? (Leo pgs
Some common words found in the essay are:
Jersey Turnpike, York City, Civil Liberties, Transit Police, Jersey Police, Racial Profiling, Illinois Hispanics, Hilary Clinton, Bill Bradley, Col Williams, racial profiling, york city, drummond 61, traffic stops, transit police, jersey police, leo 16, drug traffickers, civil rights, leo pgs 16-20, police york, outlawing racial profiling, ariz highway patrol, superintendent jersey police,
Approximate Word count = 1619
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)
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